


A Drunken Heart

by RussianEmpress



Category: Klaus (2019)
Genre: M/M, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-12-01
Updated: 2019-12-27
Packaged: 2021-02-26 06:42:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 25,028
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21629293
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RussianEmpress/pseuds/RussianEmpress
Summary: Trying to escape the rain, Jesper finds himself stuck below deck on Mogens' boat. With nothing else to do but drink to pass the time, Mogens finds out that Jesper's a lightweight. He finds out other things as well.
Relationships: Jesper Johanseen / Mogens
Comments: 84
Kudos: 357





	1. Down The Hatch

**Author's Note:**

> I’m going to fudge up the events at the end of the movie a tad. 
> 
> So this takes place after the Ellingboes and Krums’ kids get married, but before Jesper dives into his monologue that sums up the twelve year jump into the future at the end.
> 
> Jesper hasn’t hooked up with Alva yet (so no porch kiss and blatant “And Alva? Well of course she loves me”) and he’s currently on track going into the “second year of Christmas” with Klaus. They had their first successful Christmas run in Smeerensburg, but there’s no vast expansion yet. 
> 
> Cool? Ok! Heeeeere we go!

It happened in a minute. Less even. 

Jesper was minding his own business, waltzing down the cobblestones of the lowest stone bridge of Smeerensburg, slim fingers paging through the stack of letters in his hand, when the air around him seemed to shift. 

Something changed, he could taste it. He could even smell it, an earthy coolness that suddenly filled the air. A chill ran up his back and for the first time in months, it wasn’t from the cold. 

When he looked up from the neatly inked address he was reading, he saw it. There it was. A behemoth of an angry storm cloud that had manifested completely out of nowhere, rolling over the whole width of Smeerensburg. 

Not a second later, with the blond post man’s mouth falling open at the sight of it, did a solid wall of rain began to fall, steadily inching its way closer to him.

 _SssssssssssssSSSSSSSSHHHHHHHHHHHHH_ it hissed over the distance, creeping steadily closer. 

Jesper almost dropped his precious bundle of stamped letters when the biggest and brightest gash of lighting raced through the middle of that monster cloud. 

When the ear splitting crash of thunder cracked the air, it made him literally jump and without even thinking about it, turned tail and ran. 

The man clad in blue was never one to think clearly in a state of panic, Klaus or Alva could tell anyone that. It wasn’t the lighting that spooked him, even though he swore that particular crack of thunder made the earth beneath his feet tremble. 

It was the rain. If he could take cover, he would be spared getting not just wet, but absolutely drenched. 

Having snow fall on you from rooftops, or having the rare snowball chucked your way would just leave Jesper chilled to the bone and annoyed. Understandable, as children just couldn’t stay pure and proper all day, every day, year after year for the rest of their lives without getting a bit board of the mundane.

But being a soppy wet mess, with every inch of you soaked and your finely pressed uniform clinging to you like a second skin, and standing all willy-nilly in the middle of Smeerensburg’s sub-below zero temperature winter? 

Jesper could just feel the pneumonia waiting to grow in his lungs. It killed his mother. And she was surrounded by doctors and servants to tend to her every little whim and pained cry in a silk sheet covered bed. What chance would he have here, in his creaky and snow covered post office, alone, and coughing himself to death. 

So he ran. 

And he ran the wrong direction. 

He went down the docks. 

“Oh, brilliant, you idiot!” he yelled out loud to himself. “You’re running AWAY from the rooftops for cover! Stupid, stupid, STUPID!”

But Jesper almost couldn’t hear himself over the threatening hiss at his back. It was too late to stop now. He could hear the rain behind him, the hairs on the back of his neck standing up from the electric charge in the air. 

Oh Christ. Just his luck. Just his stupid, non-existent luck. 

The Ferryman’s boat. It was docked and securely knotted and roped to the only port in the whole city. 

The boat, the white lump of rust stained metal and splintered wood, bobbed up and down in the thick white foam of the bay’s shore. With the storm rolling it, the ocean’s waves grew in height and speed. The ferry ship started to tug in it’s rope like an ill behaved dog. 

Mogens, the heavy set Captain, was nowhere to be seen. Probably down at the Inn or bar, well out of the way of the storm’s threat. Probably smiling into his glass as he was comfortable seated somewhere warm, about to enjoy watching the serine rainfall. With Jesper’s luck, he guessed he probably even saw Jesper running like a scared lunatic being chased by rain through a bar window, the opposite way of town and was trying not to choke on his drink while he laughed and pointed. 

Like it mattered. Jesper never cared what that mean spirited sailor thought about him. Though it did feel good to shut the window pane on him, all those months ago. With his boot no less, when the Captain’s shocked face came barreling through his post office’s window to mock him at his lack of mail, only to find the room bustling with a dozen or more children. Sand colored envelopes flapping above their heads like victory flags. 

The memory distracted Jesper momentarily as he didn’t even know what he had done in his panicked sprint towards the only cover on this side the whole island. 

He had jumped off the dock. 

Jesper’s long legs kicked off the edge of the dock, no proper loading deck out before him like last time, and landed squarely on top of the boat’s deck. The boat rocked with his sudden thrust of his weight.

Torso bent and twisted, one leg sticking out, his arms flapping around feverishly to keep his balance, Jesper thought how cruel it would be if he overshot and stumbled into the frigid waters below. 

When he steadied himself, his mail carrier whipped around him like a slingshot behind him, the stuffed purse smacking his back. Satisfied he wasn’t about to go over the side, he took a step towards the one-man bridge with no door (if you could even call it a ‘bridge’ on such a tiny toy boat).

He never made it to his shelter. 

He barely heard wood scrape on wood before he’s being yanked backwards so hard, it hurt and he yelped out in pain and surprise. 

The world whizzed by him when he was pulled. Ocean, dock, rain, sky, all become one big blue paint brush stroke. It was all flipped upside down as he was pulled downward, ass first into a hole, into a well furnished cabin, reds, golds, ambers, and spots of oak wood surrounded him. 

Thud.

His body hits the floor, a plush rug, and then he hears two things at once. A heavy shutting of a trap door, heavy hinges and a bolt locking out the outside world and the white noise from the never ending, _Sssssssshhhhhhhhhhh_. 

The sound engulfs the entire boat.

It doesn’t stop. It rains forever. 

Lying flat on his back, Jesper rapidly blinks at his new surroundings. His hands coming up to cradle his dinged head. 

One second he was above deck, a storm about ready to swallow him up it’s endless curtain of raindrops and now he was...where was he? Below deck? This hunk of junk of a ferry boat had a “below”? 

“Had enough of the woodsmen, eh? Trying to get off this rock and steal my boat while you’re at it too, huh? Nothing doing, Postman.” 

Jesper tilted his head up and standing above him was the one and only Ferryman. From his position on the floor, Jesper first and foremost saw Mogen’s round gut standing above him. Then still looking up, could only see the top half of his face, but if Jesper knew the man well enough, he didn’t need to see his shit-eating grin that must have been plastered on that mug of his. His turned up shinning fox eyes already told him that the other man must had been grinning ear to ear, staring down at him like that. 

Mogens always did get a weird jolly out of tripping Jesper, like a bully child in the school yard. And now, he had thrown him to the ground with such gusto, he must have been having the time of his life. 

He probably enjoyed giving him that hard yank backwards, catapulting him off his feet and sending him flying down, down below, crashing onto his backside painful.

Making him yelp out like a little school girl in panic must have been the highlight of the Captain’s dull existence

“Ow,” Jesper muttered, “ow, ow, ow.” 

He rubbed the back of his neck. He tried to roll up on to his elbow before a fingerless gloved paw grabs the front of his uniform in a powerful grip. Mogens hoisted him up to stand not-too-gently. 

Jespers too tall. He’s always been too tall. His sore head hits a beam above him as he’s straightened out vertically. He’s forced to slouch in the Captain's small cabin. 

Jesper starts wagging his finger at Mogens, eyes scrunched up as he feels a beautiful headache starting to bloom. He’s about to really have the Captain have a piece of his mind, but he stops mid vowel, his eyes widening as he looks at the shorter man. 

“Is...is that a rifle?” 

Mogens was leaning as easy and carefree as an already rich oil man who had just struck a 20 foot long ravine of oil with a pick ax by accident. 

“You’re very observant aren’t you. Observant Mr. Postman. Nothing gets passed you,” he smoothly drawls out, poking fun. 

Damn that permanent grin of his. Jesper fumes mildly. Jesper’s scowl doesn’t stay long. It lightens when he realized what he was staring at. 

The gun wasn’t what surprised Jesper. He had spent the better half of his first year here in Smeerensburg’s being actually shot AT. 

His father had always had a large collection of firearms after all in their home.

It was the Captain. Mogens was standing with one hand in a trouser pocket, and the other cladding the underside of a double barreled shotgun. It’s muzzle pointing low at the ground.

Jesper realized that this was the first time he had ever seen Mogens without that warn out, heavy wool sailors coat with that comically high snapped up collar. 

That familiar Captain’s cap was there, but underneath that large coat that fought out the unbearably cold, Morgans wore a large thickly threaded collared white sweater with a pair of simple navy colored suspenders. 

Jesper shook his head to snap himself out of his gawking. He pointed to the well shined rifle instead. 

“Why do you have that?”

“Why were you sneaking about on my deck?” 

“I wasn’t sneaking!” Jesper protested. He placed a fanned out hand on his chest as if offended. The idea of someone like -him- being accused of thievery by the likes someone like -Mogens-. 

“Trespassing then,” Mogens corrected himself. 

His eyes dropped to a half lid and that lazy smile was still on his lips. He was already starting to put the gun away, stepping back and lifting the firearm onto two mounting hooks protruding out the wall. 

“I wasn’t trespassing either. Well-” Jesper catches himself. 

He stops to think. A long “uuuuh” coming out of his mouth when he couldn’t find a snappy enough response. Mogens was eyeing him lazily.

“Ok. Well, I guess. Maybe. I sort of was, but it’s not what you think.” 

Mogens gave him a sideways glance. It was clear he didn’t actually care for the Postman's reasoning. When he found out it was just -Jesper- who jumped onto his boat’s deck, acting his usually foolish self, all threat from the situation melted away. 

After his ship’s barometer and rain gauge spun out of control, hours ago, Mogens secured his boat and bunkered down in his cabin, as one did when a nasty storm was promised to pass overhead. 

Once the older sea captain heard the sudden thud of a person’s weight above his head, then the the firmailr rhythmic steps of boots, he naturally assumed it was a thief. Someone who was hoping the captain of the ship had retreated to land to wait out the storm. 

This wouldn’t be the first time some drunk Krum or idiotic Ellingboe tried to take off with his ferry. 

When heard the sporadic steps above him, making the ol’ girl’s hull groan and creak, did Mogens grab his rifle, fully loaded and stuffed with gun powder, did he open the cabin’s latch up, ready to fire into the unlucky bastard's head up above. 

He was quiet and slow when he lifted up and opened the wooden door to the bunker. One eye already squeezed shut, the other looking down the hair lines, trigger finger cocked and ready. 

But then he saw blond. 

The back of the postman’s head. Bright blond hair under that unmistakable blue hat. 

Jesper. 

The dolt that wasn’t looking at his direction. Mogens hand on the trigger fell away and reached out instead to grab the Postman’s satchel that was right at his arm’s level. 

He wasn’t going to let Jesper near the controls of his boat, even though he had no doubt what-so-ever that he wasn’t acting as a thief right now. The rich boy would have snagged something by the controls on accident. Probably. And Mogens would only find out that his wheel was jammed when he would be at the tail end of a tidal wave in the middle of the ocean before he found out about it. 

He wasn’t going to take his chances though. Instead, as the wind was starting to blow the sheet of rain droplets their directions, with only seconds to spare before the real downpour was upon them, he yanked the boy back. He cavoted half way out the hole in the floor, extended his arm, and his thick fingers clutched around satchel's strap.

Like a fish caught on a line, Jesper jerked and flopped backwards when felt his feet leave the ground and the sudden feeling of being grabbed and pulled. He had thought he had gotten used to the feeling when Klaus physically lifted him up all the time. 

Mogens on the other hand had no idea the young man could be so light. Light in the head maybe, a little dim, but when he pulled him back he didn’t intend for him to be picked right off his feet. He flung him easier than a flag caught in the wind. 

He had to admit though, he did wince a bit when Jesper went thud and then thunk on the hard floor. But he seemed alright enough. Mogens didn’t offer him a helping hand up. 

Mogens found Jesper to be a bit too aloof for his liking. Braty, too. Once he learned that the Postman was the son of a headmaster of the royal postal service...well. If the world royal was in anything tied in with the family business, it usually meant there was money involved. And Jesper came from a lot of it, from what Mogens heard in town folk’s gossip. 

Jesper was well liked enough in Smeerensburg. Sure. But that didn’t keep the no longer feuding families from gossiping merrily at their cook-outs or brunches. 

“So?” Mogens asks. 

He ran a hand over the butt of the gun now back on the wall, brushing away invisible dust. The tall blond man just watching him. 

“So what?” Jesper echoes back. 

“Well there aren’t any mailboxes over here at the dock. And there sure as hell isn’t one on the deck. I thought you were pretty good at your job and knew that already. Or do you need Ol’ Captain Mogens to tell you that?”

Jesper made a face. 

“No, thank-you-very-much. I was trying to beat the rain.” 

“Beat the rain? Where you having a foot race with it to see who could get to the ocean first?”

Now Mogens sounded both baffled and intrigued. Maybe Jesper hit his head a little too hard on the rug. There was no beating the rain out on this side of the island. 

Jesper let out a long exasperated sigh. “No,” he said again, a hint of braty mocking tone in voice, “I was not trying to beat the rain in a foot race to the ocean,” he chiacked in one single breath, hands now akimbo. He looked like an old nag with his shoulders forcibly bent over. 

Then he crossed his arms stubbornly and much more quietly, “I just needed a place to duck under to avoid getting drenched.” 

He shrugged when Mogens’ silence was clearly heard as ‘aaaaaaaand soooooooo you came out to the open docks beeeeeeeecaaaaaaause...’ “But I took the wrong route and ended up at the docks. It was too late to turn around to seek another roof. Then I saw your boat. I thought I could wait it out in your little Captain hut thingy.”

“The helm’s basket? You wanted to ‘wait out’ a category seven downpour in a crappy, old, barely welded together helm’s basket with no door? Which, I will remind you right now, is missing two of it’s window panes, if you didn’t notice,” Mogens stated. 

“Oh brother,” he then added and gave out a hearty round bell laugh. He shook his head at Jesper. The blond man couldn’t help but seem to blush a bit at the expense of his own embarrassment.

Mogens looked at Jesper as if he was the dumbest creature on the planet. Dumber than any Krum or Ellingboe put together to create a new kind of stupid. 

“Well lucky for you, I was here to snatch you up to nice, dry, safety.”

“Yeah lucky me,” Jesper snarked under his breath. He unconsciously flexed his starting-to-ache bent over neck.

Then after a moment of silence where the hull hummed with that never-ending pitter pattering of a billion raindrops hitting the sides of the boat, Jesper finally asked, looking about, “What is this place anyway?” 

Jesper looked around what honestly reminded him of a rich man’s study, if it wasn’t for the fact it was no larger than a rabbit’s hole. But it’s small size made the rest of the furnishings feel warm and welcoming. It was all so cramped yet cozy. 

How many posh studies had he visited when he tagged along with his father to a family friend and their luxury homes. With their grand personal library and cigar rooms that Jesper explored and dragged a small hand over every surface aimlessly while adults talked about boring trade and boring business. 

Jesper saw a fine plush rug was under his feet, rich in pattern and design. Oil lamps in gold fastenings lined the walls and lit up framed paintings of scenic landscapes or beautiful studies of birds or bowls full of fruits.

A large map of the world rolled out flat covered a wall, clippings of newspaper article and what looked like to be hand drawings of plants thumbtacked into the wood. Lined school paper with what looked like random numbers and math questions scribbled in ink filled in the empty space in between everything. 

Jesper doubted those doodles could have been drawn by Mogens. They were too good. 

There was not much left to the cabin after that. A bed was nestled into the nook corner of the hull. It was neatly made with thick checkered quilts, which Mogens decided to right then and there to step to and sat down upon. 

The last item was a simple small oak round table across from where Mogens sat now. More sprawled out maps laid open on top of it, making them look like a decorative table cloth, while pencils and and a compass moved side to side with the boat’s movements as the rain kept up it’s assault. 

And on top of all that was Mogens’ dinner. A single plate with piles of streaming peas, mashed potatoes and two thick bratwurst. Fat slabs of butter was dripping over everything. There was a loaf of thickly sliced bread too and a shot glass. Next to it, a tall, full bottle of something clear. It’s liquid innards also swaying along with the movement of the boat. 

Jesper only now noticed how good it smelled in the tight nit cabin. 

Mogens also noticed Jesper eyeing his meal. 

“You drink?” 

“Huh?” 

Mogens’ pantomimed with pinched fingers swinging an invisible glass towards his mouth. 

“Drink,” he said dully, though with a bit of a grin, “Alcohol. You. Partake?”

Jepser narrowed his eyes.

“I know wh-” he signed curtly and shouldered off his satchel full of letters like that of a fussy child trying to kick off wet soggy socks of his feet, “-you know what. Sure! Sure. Why not. I’m stuck here with you because of, well, YOU, so yes, I might as well take a drink for my sanity and wait for the storm to clear.” 

Mogens’ bobbles his head side to side at the suddenly provoked Postman. 

“Oh oh, please, right this way, sir,” he said with a sweep of his arm, gesturing Jesper over to the other side of the table, “right this way.” 

Jesper was about to ask something mean spirited, something along the lines of Mogens’ being too poor to afford two chairs, since the man was jestering for him to sit in, well, nothing. There was no second chair to sit in. 

But then he thought of a better come back and was about to say something really witty- something really clever- something like “just because I get chased by dogs all day doesn’t mean I’m going to sit like one in front of you.” Oh YES. That was so smart! So good! So -

Mogens heeled the side of the wall under the table and then a little compartment built into the boat’s hull was being pushed in. It made a clicking sound. The compartment, Jesper could now see it’s hidden outline, popped out. And just like magic (well, logically Jesper knew it was just a rigged up hidden piece of woodwork, not that impressive, but he just wasn’t expecting it) there was a second seat. 

“That old woodsmen isn’t the only one around here that can tinker with tools you know,” Mogens said. 

Jesper took the seat and gingerly sat. Or tried to the best he could. The cabin was cramped as it was, even Mogens with his heavier build stepped mostly sideways from one end of the other, and Jespers long knobby knees turned inward so he could sit without hitting the underside of the table. 

A glass was placed in front of him. It didn’t match Mogens’ cup. 

A tight lipped pop rang out like a shot as the ferryman uncorked the clear bottle before them. He poured Jesper that offered drink, straight and true, no tricks, and then poured a hearty helping for himself. 

He lifted his glass and waited for Jesper to do the same. When Jesper didn’t react, Mogens cleared his throat and gave him a steely eyed look. That moxie grin flattening. 

“Bad luck not to cheers at the Captain’s table, especially in his own cabin. -Especially- on the water.”

Mogens seemed to have gained height just now, even though they were both sitting. Maybe because that friendly glint in his eye that was always there had been extinguished in the serious moment. 

Jesper grabbed his glass quickly and the moment the glasses clinked, Mogrens’ grin slipped back into place. The glint in his brown eyes was fired back up. Followed by a real swig this time, he downed the shot. 

Jesper did the same motion but nearly spit up the burning acid that coated the back of his throat. When the other man started to laugh at him again, he forced himself to swallow it, though he couldn’t suppress the light fit of coughs afterwards. 

It burned. Badly. 

It wasn’t the smooth rich flavored sherry he used to, and even those small glasses were few in between. Had he had any since being in town? He laughed at the idea of this one horse town having something in it’s bars or shops that was anything more high brow than beer and fermented potatoes. 

Mogens’ slapped a meaty hand on Jesper’s shoulder across the tiny table.

He didn’t ask if he wanted another one. Jesper’s glass was refilled anyway. This time he didn’t have to raise his glass to meet Morgens. Mogens just smacked his glass to Jespers. Less of a cheer this time and more of a light heartedly acknowledgment of the other man’s presence. 

Nothing more, nothing less. 

There was no way Jesper was going to throw it down this time, hesitant to even have a second glass. But he picked it up anyway. He brought it to his nose and frowned when he couldn't detect a scent. 

God he missed his father’s sherry. 

“What the heck is this stuff?” Jesper wheezed out when he could catch his breath, a hand covering his abused mouth. A few more coughs escaping. 

“Oh this? Some of Smeerensburg bestest moonshine. Ehhh, some vodka too that I threw in. Them Sámis you bring over here once a year also make a fine brew too. They offered me a bottle of something they made in exchange for chartering something over to the North part of the island. Nice folk.” 

Jesper nodded along, even though his eyebrow was raised curiously at the odd clear cocktail in the bottle. Before he knew it, he was bringing the edge of the glass up to his lips again. A tiny sip was much more manageable.

Mogens’ gave him an approving nod and then one more smile before he took a folded cloth napkin and snapped it open with a flick of his wrist. He stuffed the corner end of it into his sweater’s turtleneck, picking up his knife and fork.

Mogens’ didn’t offer him anything off his plate and Jesper didn’t ask. They sat in a relatively comfortable silence while the never ending ‘sssssshhh sssshhhh shhhhhh’ kept them company in the dull white noise of the hull.

Sip after tiny sip, Jesper just nursed his drink and watched the boatman start cutting into his meats while also taking bigger mouthfuls of the moonshine. 

Jepster was just about to mutter out a small “thank you”, a random lesson Klaus had instilled in him, among many others, in the dead of night during one of their runs- saying “thank you” to someone for performing even the smallest of good deeds, could resident with someone for much longer than one would think. And could come back as a good sign of will later to that person.

-“Oh, you mean like, karma?”Jesper asked quizzically.-

-“I don’t know who this Karma fellow is, but if he has nice things come back to him often, he must say thank you quit a lot.” Klaus said and snapped the reins of his reindeer with a smile.-

But Jesper didn’t say thank you. He suddenly thought of something else. With eyes wide and hand tightening on his glass, he burst out, 

“Wait, wait. Wait a second. You’re telling me...you had this cozy little cabin here this whole time? But when you brought me to Smeerensburg for the first time, you almost let me freeze to death above deck in the bitter, frozen sea wind!?” 

Mogens froze lifting a spoon full of peas into his open mouth. He looked up, searching his memory and popped the spoon in when he remembered what Jesper was talking about. He shrugged and chewed.

“I was doing you a favor!” he answered without hesitation, “I was just accumulating you to the weather, is all.”

“...Accumulating?” 

“That’s right. I didn’t want the new postman to hit the shore and then die from the shock of cold once you popped that pretty little head of yours out the cabin port door like a freshly picked daffodil.” 

Jesper’s eyes narrowed dangerously. 

“It was a four hour boat ride. Icicles grew on the brim of my hat.”

“Four hours of solid accumulating. You’re welcome.” 

Looks like Jesper said thank you to Mogens without actually saying it. That bastard... 

The leaner man was ready to pick a fight, but his anger melted away a heartbeat later. His shoulders dropped and the fist he had formed unclenched. He snorted through his nose instead. 

The metallic scrape of Mogens’ teeth against the metal fork rang out again. 

“Why are so mean to me?” Jepser asks. 

“Keep drinking and maybe I’ll tell you.” 

There was that damn smile again. Jesper took another tiny sip, deciding he would just sit there and glare for as long as he could.

As long as he was stuck here, thankful to say the least that Mogens pulled him down here instead of leaving him above deck shivering in the half exposed bridge, he might as well keep any pity bickering at bay. 

At least for now. 

The skipper was on his fourth shot and well into his meal when Jesper decided to speak again. 

“I didn’t know Smeerensburg had crazy storms like this.” 

“It doesn’t. Freak roll in, is what this is. Happens. But rarely. The whole town will become one big ice death trap when it’s over. Black ice freezes here quicker than the underside of a coal miner’s belt buckle,” Mogens explained through mouthfuls of peas.

He shrugged then as if to say “whatcha gonna do about it.” 

“It, heh, it actually used to be funny to watch the Krums and Ellingboes use that to their oh-so-impressive-strategy-tactics. Lots of broken necks, I can tell you that much.” 

Morgans’ gave a gruesome jerk of his neck and a mock wince of pain. His features curling up to show just how bad that must have hurt the poor bastard that was pushed down ten flights of stairs or sent flying over a balcony for no other reason than having a different last name from someone else. 

Jesper was listening so intently that he was surprised when he lifted his glass again and found it empty. He looked down into the glass and sure enough, he had sipped his way through a second helping. 

The moonshine’s bottle long neck hit the ellipse of his glass before he could protest yet another refill. The pure clear liquor poured freely again. 

“Which are you?” Jesper asked. 

Mogens didn't bother to cork the bottle this time when he set it back down between them. 

He lifted a bushy unkempt eyebrow at him. 

“Come again?”

Jesper over exaggerated his finger pointing and took on the same slow tone Mogens did with him earlier. 

“Which. You. Surname.” he pointed to Mogens and then toward a port window. “Ell-ing-boe or Krrrruuum,” he also over enunciated the family names to really drive his point home. 

Jesper felt himself smirking for the first time in the captain’s presence. It felt pretty good. He took a larger sip of his drink while Mogens stared at him blankly for a moment. 

“Aaaaah. Oh. Uhh, neither.” 

The blond man’s smirk fell. That wasn’t the answer he was expecting. 

“Neither? But-” 

“But what?”

“Don’t you live-”

“Here? In Smeerensburg? Sure. But I live here.”

The captain’s arm reaches behind him and pats the boat’s interior affectionately. A genuine smile forms on his features as he continues to chew. 

“Here?”

“Well sure. What? Or haven’t you ever noticed I have never on your route in the past year, postman.” 

“I just thought you never got any letters because nobody likes you.”

Jesper starts to scramble to take back what he said. He meant, but he didn’t -mean- it. Once Klaus yelled at him with such fury, he kicked him out of his home for upsetting him.

He worried the boatman would do the same now, rain be damned and tell him to get the hell out. But he didn’t. The opposite. Mogens laugh was almost contagious. Jesper can’t help but smile, even though its nervous, because surely a very nasty insult was right behind one of those large belly snigger. 

Mogens poured him more drink. 

“People- ha- people here do hate me, but only because I was one of the few folk around here that remained neutral and still stayed in the town. Better to stick off the land when the whole damn island is trying to tear itself apart. I’m not one to be run out of town, no sir.” 

He throws back his drink and breaths through his teeth. He refills himself another glass. The bottle was a little less than half full then. 

“I’m also an asshole, but you already knew that,” he gave Jesper a wink over his shot glass. One more down the hatch. Another refill. 

Jesper smiled politely enough and rolled his eyes. 

“Klaus only makes toys for the itty bitty kiddos anyway, right?”

Jesper’s starting to enjoy the warm burn in his lungs as his drink becomes easier to handle. He perks up at the mention of his mysterious friend. 

“Err, well yes.” 

“If I write to the big guy a letter, will you come and deliver me a present?” Morgens tone went up three notches and he batted his eyelashes. 

Jesper snorts and does an odd giggle. It was clear that the young man had poor practice in drinking. 

“Sure. Whatcha want? A tugboat on a string?” Jesper feels himself getting drunk. He doesn’t usually laugh at his own stupid jokes. 

Mogens found him funny enough though and the larger man slaps a hand on the table and cackles. A few pencils roll off the edge. They clatter around Jesper’s boots. He bends over to pick one up. 

He examines the wood bleached writing tool in his hand, twirling it around with any easy flourish. 

“You draw those?” he asks and tilts his chin up at the inked and pencil sketches on the edge of the large map on the wall behind him.

“Aye.” 

“They’re really..uhh..really, um, good? Good. Never figured you to have talent in anything.”

Again, he’s caught off guard with how blunt he was being. He promised it was because of the liquor. He quickly adds, 

“You should draw something for Klaus. He’s a fantastic draftsman, but I’m sure he could use some fresh inspiration. I mean how many times can you make the same rocking horse blueprints or nutcracker.”

Though the smile is still on Morgens’ lips, the snort he pushed out his nose is less than enthusiastic. 

“Right. I’ll get right on that,” he says in a low gruff and takes another shot. He had finished his meal and the rain still flooded the world outside. It was time to just drink and chat. 

They chatted about everything.

The more Jesper drank, which was becoming quicker too, he chirpped away about everything he could think of. Mogens more or less just nodded along, bursting out a quick chores of chuckles or more snorts when Jesper said something insightful. 

It almost felt like he was trying to get Mogens to laugh. 

They talked about Klaus the most. The rest of the town was rather boring. The town was famous for its fighting families, but if had only been two the two same factions since the dawn of time, well, that wasn’t too fascinating.

Klaus was at least interesting to chit chat about. He was neither Krum nor Ellingboe. He just showed up one day on the map and that was that. 

Jesper tried to dig up any information Mogens had on him.

“Never knew him. Don’t think we exchanged a single word before, ehhh, well, before all this.” he waves around the room, referring to the whole “Christmas thing” that just happened a few weeks ago.

“But you knew his cabin was out there. Said-said he was a “real nice fella’” 

“Yeah, so? Was I wrong?”

“Yeah. No. Yeah. Well. No. You weren’t. He wasn’t. -Isn’t-. Wasn’t not ever nice. Is nice.” 

It was Mogens turn to dig. He wanted Jesper to spill the means and unearth some horrible secret. Something the the big man shared with Jesper in the dead of night. Jesper wasn’t the first, nor the last, to think the bear-like woodsmen who was always so suspiciously quiet and never ever came into town wasn’t indeed an actual ax wielding maniac. 

The boat captain was hoping to hear something that would turn the town on its head. Something dark. Something evil! Something saucy. A body! 

But there was a body, Jepser admitted sadly. His stare grew to a hundred yards into his glass. 

There was a body. Only one. Buried deep in those pure white snow covered woods. 

A little wife who left Klaus alone and childless.

He built her birdhouses. That’s why there were hundreds of toys. 

Jesper said it was because she got sick. Got sick after trying to fill the huge home with dozens of kids.

Mogens shook his head and said, “No. Not sickness. Heartbreak.” 

Klaus remained isolated from the town forever after that and from what Jesper was describing, was just waiting to die. 

Chopping wood, making quirky little birdhouses, just waiting for his time to go. Alone. 

How sad.

Jesper suddenly looked like he wanted to cry. 

Mogens leaned over and tapped his glass to Jesper’s and together, in a somber cheers, saluted on Klaus’ behalf. 

“He’s great though, you know? Do you him? He knows everyone. Literally. He just...knows. You know what else ‘knows’. The wind. The windssss magic, yo-you know that too, yeah?” Jesper said happily, drunken mood shifting from one extreme to the next in the drop of a hat.

Mogens couldn’t open his eyes up all the way anymore. They remained half lidded as he listened to Jesper babble on. 

“Suuure, sure. Wind. Magic. Yup. Uuuuh... yup.”

He was starting to feel the haziness himself. Which was saying a lot. He must have drank three times more than the postman.

This wasn’t his plan tonight, to get drunk, but he had no complaints. 

They also clinked their glasses together in a messy fashion when the conversation turned light again. They both agreed that the elder head Krum mistress must have been the world’s most beautiful women if she ended up looking like the world’s oldest living fossil. And that son of her’s…

“Think she pushed him out naturally?” 

“Sure! Along with two draft horses yanking with all their might!” 

Mogens patted his eyes with the back of his hand, crying, his face a tomato red now. The bottle nearly empty. Jesper gave up long ago on trying to sit up straight and could only prop himself up by his elbows on the table. 

The bottle was empty. 

Jesper was red in his cheeks and kept bobbing his head, fighting to stay awake. He was trying to stay in his seat. 

“They’re good people though,” Jesper said, suddenly snapping up, spooked. A terrifying look in his eye. Almost as if he didn’t say something nice right after something not so nice, something bad might happen. 

He slurred, what Mogens’ thought was ‘naughty list’, under his breath and Jesper frowned, eyebrows pitched up in worry. His head sunk down. 

“Uh huh,” Mogens said and then stood. He swayed a bit, put his hands on his lower back and leaned backwards as far as his wide girth would allow him to, cracking his back in the most satisfying way.

Ka-kak-crack went his spine. He grunted happily. 

Then he tilted his head curiously when he realized that the only sounds he heard was the waves of the ocean slapping the side of his boat and Jespers loud breathing. He squinted at the port window. 

He could see the dock. The hull was no longer vibrating while encased in rain. 

The rain stopped.

“Well would you look at that. We’re saved. Kaloo Kalay, what a day. Hey Mr. Pos-”

Mogens shut his mouth when Jesper, blacked out, had fallen face first onto the table. A moment later, fell out of his seat completely and happily continued to sleep on the floor when he hit it.

“Oh,” Mogens said and did the only decent thing he had ever done to Jesper in the past year or so he had grown to know him. 

He could have left him there, but instead he hoisted the lad back up by his shoulders, somewhat, half way. He was having a hard time seeing straight himself. He lifted him up by the waist, encircling his arms around the stick figure that was passed out and gently slumped Jesper onto the edge of his bed. 

The blond stayed up for half a second before falling backwards. His legs still firmly on the ground while his top half sprawled out on the captain’s quilts. 

Mogens rolled his eyes at him. 

“Oh by all means, make yourself comfortable,” he said out loud to deaf ears. 

Jesper wasn’t going anywhere any time soon. 

Unlatching the top doorway, Mogens stepped up the little ladder that unfolded for him and poked his head out. The rush of fresh air, cleanly doused in fresh rain and his forever beloved sea was incredible to feel against his drunken flushed face. 

Stepping into it felt ever more amazing. Brisk. Cool. It was enough to almost sober him up. Almost. 

He pulled himself out of the deck below and went to go stand at the back of the ferry. It was almost dark. The sun would set in a few hours or so. Stars had come out into the sea. They danced among the swaying waves in the setting twilight. 

The eerie stillness of everything after a God-like-wrath flood was always pleasant. This wasn’t the first time he had been caught in an all mighty, all consuming downpour before. 

When the world turned into a washed out blanket, only to be pulled back up to relieve a clean sky and cleansed earth, it was remarkable to see it. To feel it. His ocean was renewed with a new coat of paint. What a sight it was. 

Mogens breathed in deep and stared out into oblivion. Shame Jesper was such a lightweight. 

He would have enjoyed the view. 

///

Jesper wasn’t comfy. 

There were incredibly rare (or ever), moments that Jesper had been comfortable while being forced to live in Smeerensburg. But right now...he was half way there.

He blinked lazily, like a cat that had too much milk to drink and leaned up. Ah, there was the problem. He was only HALF on a bed. 

No, no. That wouldn’t do. His back felt so comfortable. It was only fair his legs could feel it too.

He picked his legs up and scooted himself into the top corner, where it felt like it was the warmest. He grabbed the only lumpy pillow he saw and buried his face as deep as he could into it. 

He smiled. Oh that felt great. The pillow was cool against his heated face. And the mattress? Oh! Heaven! A hundred times better than the slab he tried to sleep on in his post office. 

Was it as nice as his silk sheeted bed at home? 

‘Let’s not kid ourselves, Jespy ol’ boy, nothing is as nice as my silk sheets. But this’ll do.’ he thought in his gin...vodka...hooch...moonshine and whatever else drowned brain. 

Jesper took a nice deep breath as he felt himself drifting off again. Properly this time. 

He clutched the pillow harder to himself. The pillow smelled of the sea. Salt and long ago worn out cologne that stained itself into the cotton blend. 

And something else. Something familiar. Something that reminded him of home.

It was a hint of sherry. Oak soaked. The kind his father always bought. 

He thought of home and allowed sleep to consume him. 

///

Mogens opened the deck latch back up and went back down only to find the blond man curled up in the corner of his bed. Jesper’s soft rhythmic breathing made his back rise and fall. 

Mogens shook his head at him. 

The older skipper was about to turn about face and leave the postman be. Although, later, he would tease him mercilessly when he woke back up. He could picture it now, eyes a bit bloodshot and panicked that he had missed the rest of the day’s deliveries. 

He would also miss his nightly rondevu with Klaus, Mogens thought, as the sun was steadily setting. The town’s lights starting to twinkle on, house by house. 

Mogens couldn’t say what it was that came over him to do what he did next. He would blame the strong moonshine for it later and the light hearted feeling he had from his rather joyful chat with Jesper. 

But he turned back to look at Jesper.

He stepped back to his bed and sat as softly as his bulk would allow him to on the edge. 

Jesper didn’t stir. 

Mogens leaned back on his arm, peering over to peek a glance at Jesper’s face. Yup. Out like a damn light. Mouth hanging a little open, his cheeks and ears had turned as bright red as his nose usually looked when he was delivering mail in the middle of a blizzard. His well kept hair mussed and falling every which way. 

That’s when Mogen’s thick fingers reached over and did the damnedest thing. He brushed those loose blond strands out of Jesper’s face. He brushed them back over his forehead to join the rest of his thick blond mane. 

The sleeping man kept breathing steadily. Mogens turned to look straight before him. He watched the clear skies above him through a port window. Well, as ‘clear’ as Smeerensburg would allow. 

He didn’t know how long he locked eyes with the sky, but when he blinked, he turned back to look at Jesper again.

Nimble fingers reached out and picked the edge of Jesper’s collar, at the nape of his neck, and pulled the white cotton shirt down, exposing a bit of pale flesh at his back. 

When Mogen’s lips touched the top notch of Jesper’s spine, he pressed a feather light kiss on the heated skin. He breathed in the young man’s skin. His hair. 

Jesper still didn’t stir.

Mogens lingered a moment more before pulling himself back slowly. He imagined that if he was a woman, he would have left a perfect lipstick stamp of a kiss for everyone to whistle at behind, literally, Jesper’s back. A whistle that would catch Jesper off guard and confused as to why suddenly he was turning into a new target for everyone to pick on. 

But there was no mark. There was nothing. Not even the lingering taste of the postman’s skin on Mogens lips. This wasn’t some romance novel that Mogens may or may not have read a few times out at sea over long uneventful nights. 

Jesper would never know. But he would. And that was perfectly fine for the ferryman. 

His fingers unpitched the fabric of the shirt.

He placed his hands on top his knees once more and propelled himself up to stand again. He adjusted his hat aimlessly. Instead of making his way back up to his deck, he picked up the pencil Jesper was twirling earlier in those long fingers of his.

Swapping seats with Jesper, sitting on the other side of the table, Mogens lifted the map up and pulled some blank white parchment from underneath it. 

He started to sketch out the back of the postman’s head and the rest of his sleeping form, well into the night. 

When the moon started to reflect in the ocean’s choppy waters, Jesper still didn’t wake. 

He muttered a lot in his sleep. 

And then a strange thought hit Mogens. 

Had anyone ever sent a post to the town’s only postman?


	2. I’ve Picked My Poison

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Old Navy has Klaus themed PJ pants and fuzzy socks. Did I buy them all? Yes. Did I write and edit this while I was wearing them? Ooooo yes. 
> 
> Apologies for the wait! I made it a little longer to make up for it. Thank you for all the comments and kudos. I only keep writing when I get positive feedback like the starving, approval seeking writer that I am.
> 
> Anyway. *takes a nice looooong drag of her cigarette* Enjoy!

The sea was calm after the storm. It always was. The waters never stayed angry for too long and rolled on and on into forever. The air was still and fresh. 

It was so crisp even the fish were jumping out of the water to take a bite. 

That was when Jesper’s nonsensical screaming started. And Mogens’ thought screeching seagulls were bad.

It was also when Mogens, that bastard, that _bastard_ , started to chuckle to himself. A private joke he was sharing with only himself that made him start to giggle giddily. His laugh turned into a “eeeeeheheeeheeee’ that built up as Jesper became more audible, louder and more awake below deck.

The yelling and out of place bewildered swearing never stopped while man below started to (or at least sounded like it) knock into every possession Mogens’ owned. Rumbling and crashing sounds came from somewhere below the captain’s feet.

Then that familiar blond head had popped out of the deck’s door latch; a screaming banish out of the depths of Hell was more accurate. When Jesper saw Mogens, already up and about **THE NEXT MORNING** leaning against the railing of his ferry, all Jepser could do was start screaming obscenities at his direction while he scrambled to get up and out onto the deck. 

That was when Mogens’ started laughing so hard he had to bend over himself and slap his own knee. He couldn’t get a breath in afterwards. He just laughed and laughed and couldn’t stop. It was a good thing he was already leaning against the railing or he could have laughed himself right into the waters below. 

The comical show Jesper presented him was a lovely way to start this chilled breezy day.

First Jesper’s satchel strap got caught on something below deck and it pulled him back down when he tried to shoot out of the cabin. The whiplash of the motion make Jesper ‘urk’ out loudly like a comic strip cartoon caricature. It reminded Mogens of a kangaroo rat he once saw, when he was younger. Poor thing got its tail wedged under a log in the forest and when it jumped up it looked dumbstruck as to why it was yanked back. 

When Jesper started to struggle like a hooked fish on a line, desperate to break free of the ferry’s hold of him, his hat fell off his head. He reached for it blindly and didn’t notice that when he bent over to retrieve it, his forehead smacked the side of the door’s holed frame. 

Everything became a tangled mess of feet, limbs, and a bag strap. It was all too much. Mogens was crying. 

Jesper misstepped, naturally, and fell back down into the cabin. Mogens’ swears he almost pissed his trousers. He would come up with the best joke later, something that involved the ground and mail. But for now, he just hooted and hollered. 

It only took seconds, but it might as well have been an flustering entirety for Jesper. When he finally clawed his way out, he made a jump for the dock, not caring this time if he missed, he just wanted off that damn boat, and ran down the docks at breakneck speed.

Mogens, wiping a tear from his eye, shouted after the retreating blue uniform. 

“What’s the rush, postman!? Christmas is over!!” 

//

Jesper was hungover. He overslept. He overslept because he hadn’t been hungover in months.

Oh Lord. He missed yesterday’s mail service. He was hung _over_. He drank the whole night with Mogens. He missed his nightly meeting with Klaus. 

He was such an idiot. What did he do! Oh God, if his father ever found out he lacked on his duties in order to go drinking and missed a full day of letter delivery-

“Wait!” he called out to nobody as he ran down the empty streets of town. It was too early for sane people to be up. Jesper slowed down his panicked run into a slow jog and then finally coming to a stop, breathing so hard it hurt. “Dad won’t find out. How would he find out? I’m the only postal service worker on this whole island.” 

Jesper snorted. “What am I going to do? Write myself up? Dock my own pay? Give myself suspense?” He snickered. Then he laughed. Then he slapped himself in his face. 

“Stop it! Get yourself together. You’re losing it.” 

Then he threw all his weight to the left. It felt like his own legs couldn’t support him anymore. And when did this wave of nausea hit him? Whatever building he was standing by caught his lean frame. He placed a hand over his face, sliding it down his features until he stretched them out too long. 

His eyes hurt. His mouth was stuffed with cotton. And he shouldn’t have ran that fast. His stomach churned. 

“Oh no,” he managed to mutter before violently vomiting onto the planks of...whatever unfortunate person’s shop or home he happened to be leaning against. 

In his bent over lurching state, he somehow managed to be impressed with himself. In his muddled head, he realized that he was back in town. That meant he managed to sprint like a hare on a sugar high away from the docks, up the hill, over two bridges and almost made it to the town square. 

At least he was courteous. He retched at least into the alleyway. When he was finished, he looked over to see who’s porch-side he managed to make a mess of for. 

There was a cute and lovely carved wooden sign, painted in pastel pinks and golds leaning in the window. “Knits and Knacks” it read in artsy inked lettering. In the same window also stood a very cross looking woman, a Krum, judging by her color of dress and bonnet. She had her nose crinkled up, obviously catching the tail end of Jesper’s little...show. 

When the postman gave her his best “Who? Me? I did this?” smile, she crossed her arms, unamused. Her fingers tapping on her forearm. 

“Uhhhmmm,” Jesper started, unsure of himself, “I’ll umm, I’ll take some ‘knits’ and ‘knacks’ to make up for the trouble?”

The women’s frown flipped over. She beckoned him inside, but not before offering him a handkerchief.

How kind. 

//

 _How kind my foot._ , Jesper thought bitterly. Satchel half full of day old letters and now several pieces of knitting tools and another four or five pieces of ‘knacks’, Jesper felt defeated. And robbed. 

Who knew yarn and a pair of sharp sticks could be so expensive. He also had to pay for the offered handkerchief. 

With half his coin purse empty, the postman huffed as he made his slow way home. It felt miles away, even though it was just over the hillside.

Before home though, his uneasy stomach begged him for something to eat. Stopping by one of the many shops that now remained open and unmolested- no knives, harpoons or axes wedged into its sides or roofs, Jesper sat outside the meek general store with a large cold sandwich in his hands. 

It’ll do. 

Jesper noticed his hands were shaking when he brought up his sandwich to take a bite. He frowned at them, glaring at his own fingers to settle down from sheer will power. 

What in the seven Hells did he drink last night? A terrible cocktail. A mistake. Something with gin. A gift from the Sámi. Three other things.

He ripped into the bread with his teeth before his stomach could gurgle again. Just thinking about that concoction made him queasy. 

Oh that much better. Soft bread. A mouthful of smoked pork with lots of salt was just what he needed. 

He ate the rest of his meal in the chilled morning air and headed home for much needed quiet and solitude. 

//

The trek back to his post office, his ‘home away from home’, as Mogens once called it, was thankfully uneventful. 

Slippery though. Very, very slippery. But manageable, even in his woozy state. Every other step felt like his foot was about to slip right from underneath him. 

Mogens’ wasn’t kidding. The black ice that had formed over night was something else. Even Jesper noticed the extra sharp, extra crooked icicles that formed all over the town’s roofs. The rain had turned charming little twinkling ice sculptures into monster toothed daggers. They almost looked like they had a platting of armor around them, they were so thick. He could see how booby-trapping them just right would be fatal to anyone unlucky enough to be pushed underneath one. 

He was careful to walk down the middle of the road and off the main streets. The old town’s wooden buildings didn’t look they could support any of those icicles for too much longer. Only a matter of time before they snapped off onto one unsuspecting mailman. 

His walk back home was also quiet. Thank God. Less danger and more quiet was exactly what he had prayed for. 

The streets were bare this early. No kids came up to him, all at Sunday school most likely. Did Alva teach that too? She must have. She came from a school of Nuns after all. That, and she was only teacher regardless. 

No neighbors chit chatted with him either. They were too busy wringing out clothes they didn’t pull off the laundry line fast enough before the storm him. Or patching up holes and realigning gutters that took a beating from the day’s non-stop assault from the storm clouds. 

Jesper looked up. The black smear of a thunderstorm cloud was gone without a trace. The sky was clear with a pink hue of calm clear skies now. Not a gray cloud for miles. The morning air was crisp with cold, as always, but fresh. Everything smelled wet and earthy. 

The rain in the city was much different. The rain there made everything seem brighter. The buildings would wash away, but all the lights in the street would bloom brightly. Sometimes Jesper would sit by one of the large looming French doors, feet propped up on a plush ottoman while eating something sweet, watching the rain from the warmth and safety of his room. 

People watching was boring to him. But watching people scurry for cover brought him a sick kind of funny joy. 

Jesper snorted. If that really what he used to do to pass the time back then? Sit around and bask in the misery of others? Well, maybe ‘bask’ and ‘misery’ were too harsh words when all he did was just get a silly giddy thrill by some sob running home with a newspaper over his head for cover. 

He sighed. There were a lot of aspects of his old life he didn’t miss. He didn’t want to think about them. 

Instead he focused on how nice the town looked after it’s own insane downpour of rain. 

It was nice. Lately Smeerensberg was becoming nicer and nicer. 

Jesper supposed it was alright if he felt nice too. 

When he made it to his post office, nothing looked too worse for wear on the outside. The wood walls and all the planks on the roof just looked like they got a fresh coat of paint and a good scrubbing. He had no doubt that the inside was a soggy, sopping mess though. The post office, long ago fixed up and made into a proper living space, still let the draft in. Still had holes and splintered wood every which way you looked. 

The snow didn’t just fall into his office and buried the place. But that didn’t mean snow still managed to fall in one way or another. 

There was a reason Jesper still almost froze every night in his bed. Though, after a job well done of establishing the post system in Smeerensberg, his father had sent him some money. A job well done, my boy” gift that Jepser gracefully accepted. Money that he promptly spent on extra blankets and as many thick wool socks he could get his hands on. 

Why couldn’t he have a nice warm hovel like Mogens? His bed was SO comfortable. 

Jesper stopped walking again, just shy of his porch. 

A creeping thought, as if a millipede was scuttling across his brain, squirmed up to the forefront of his fuzzy memories from last night. 

Last night…

He woke up in Mogens’ bed this _morning_. Yes, that’s right. He woke up thinking how wonderfully warm he was. How cozy he was. He thought he was back home as he was slipping out of his dream.

He had been cocooned up in thick quilts in a warm lumpy bed that was rocked gently by the sea’s waves. His head nestled in an even lumpier pillow that was so soft, it may as well have been made out of mashed potatoes, like the ones Mogens’ had for his meal. 

The pillow that smelled like oak burned sherry. 

Jesper was standing so long on his porch he didn’t realize that his draft carriage horse had walked up to the side of the office and nearly scared him half to death when it whinnied at him. 

He jumped, yelped, and whipped to the side to see his tan colored mare break him out his long paused thoughts. She whinnied at him, wanting attention. Wanting food. Wanting someone to dig the fresh caked mud out of her hooves. 

“Jesus! Stamps, you scared the daylights out of me. Oh. Oops, forgot about you didn’t I, girl?”

The horse, so loveling named by the town’s kids, picked at the wet ground with a hoof. Her ears swirling to and fore. 

The postman found it odd that he never named her himself. She was nothing more than some flea-bitten draft horse his father pulled from the cheapest breeder who was probably a day away from being sent to the glue factory. To further drive his point about hard work and if Jesper didn’t do as he was told, then THIS was the extent to his luxury in the future, etcetera, etcetera…

She proved to be at least not completely useless. A bit slow, sure. But calm and friendly. She chewed on what grass she could find buried under the snow while the children pet her. When they asked Jesper what her name was, and his “uuuuuuuuhhhhhh’ went on for too long, they started shouting out suggestions. 

Nobody liked his idea of “Maximus Power-Thunder-Strike”. Everyone loved one little red-head’s girl of idea for ‘Stamps’.

“Yeah! Like ‘stomp’! Cause she’s a horse!”

“Oh, oh! And cause she’s the postman’s mighty steed.” 

Jesper thought his name was pretty good too...but he didn’t want to fight over it. So Stamps she was. 

Jesper promised Stamps he would take care of her before the day was out and pushed his door open. He was starting to get cold for how long he stood out there.

Stepping inside the office, he was right. Everything was soaked. The chickens he shared his sorting boxes with all softly clucked and let out long vibrating _errrrs_. They flapped their wet logged wings, trying to get comfy in their damp nests. 

Walking over to a lone chair behind his desk, he tossed his satchel to the floor, and promptly fell into it. He pinched the bridge of his nose. 

There was no gold bell to summon Burgheart to bring him a warm cup of tea and something heardy from the kitchen, dripping with grease. 

Jesper let out his own annoyed _errrr_. 

What to do now? The day was fresh, true, but it was also waterlogged. He, himself, felt like a rung out rag. Hangovers were never something he approached with dignity and flourish like his father did. He lacked that ‘stiff upper lip’ when he reaped what he sowed the next morning. 

Where his father would slap himself to soberness with a dash of cologne and go back to work, necktie in place, hair combed properly, uniform pressed and ready for the day, Jesper would bellyache in his bed all day. He liked doing that after a night of drinking because it just made him feel better.

Granted, those nights were very far and few in between. Hell, it had been a whole year since coming here had he had a proper drink. And then what does he do? 

He assaults his liver with some cockamamie moonshine the ferryman offers him and downs half the bottle with him. Mogens’ was twice, if not three times, his size. If he had one more glass full he may have died in that boat. Mogens’ probably, at least, would have just got a headache. 

Jesper really was an idiot. And he was paying for it now. 

He groaned long and deep. 

“Uuuuuuuuugggggggghhhhhhhhrrrrrkkk….Ok. Ok! List time. What I ‘need’ vs. what I ‘want. Ok, so! What I want; a bath, a proper nap, more food, slippers -the fuzzy kind-, and to lie in bed for the rest of the day before I get sick again and before a headache hits. What I need; a bath, finish yesterday’s mail duties, start today’s mail duties, go see Klaus- poor guy must be so worried when I didn’t show up yesterday, take care of Stamps, and then go punch the boat man in the face for getting me drunk and screwing up my work schedule with blank disregard for the royal postal service' rules and regulations and-and-and-,” 

Jesper lost steam in his ramblings. He fluttered in his chair and signed again. 

Well at least there was one item that crossed over with his wants and needs; A bath. An honest to goodness, real bath. 

He had mourned the loss of his private, luxury bath at home. And let’s be honest and call it what it really was, a small sized osais of a pool that he could literally dive into with hot water on demand. With Burgheart standing at the ready by the edge with a hot towel to try off with and a plate of those little fig cookies Jesper always liked after a hot bath. 

But the post office didn’t have an oasis spring pool. It didn’t have a bath. It didn’t have a shower. It didn’t even have running hot water. What it did have was a stove and a few pots Jesper dug out of the snow filled pantries all those months ago. 

But once in a blue moon, Jesper allowed himself to go to the Inn. The Inn had a bath. The first time he thought of this brilliant idea was actually after he severely hurt himself one night, doing Klaus bidding of delivering toys out of fear of getting murdered if he declined. 

He fell down a chimney (of all places), face first, and it was nothing short of a miracle that he didn’t break his neck. His Adam’s apple and collarbones took the front of the hit, and unfortunately for him, because the shoot was so narrow, his long spine almost accordioned in on itself when it had no more room to go. 

Christ that hurt. He almost couldn’t crawl out of there. He was too shook up when he finally did, too much raw adrenaline running through him to show any real pain when he came back to the carriage with Klaus, the ever watchful stone guardian, barely batting an eye at him. 

When he finally made it back to his home base, he almost started ripping his hair out with how much we WANTED, no, deserved a God damn fucking bath and he just. Wasn’t. Allowed. To. Have. It. 

….At the post office. 

This made him perk up and almost forget that he could be parallelized with how bad his back was screaming at him in pain. 

It was almost dawn when he made his way over to the Inn. But the front desk women took his coin and with the persuasion of two more coins (and a few tears in his eyes), filled up a wooden tub for the beat up postman. 

The oversized wooden bucket wasn’t large enough for his knobby knees to go all the way under, but it didn’t matter. The water was hot. It was steaming! And it certainly helped his literally aching bones. 

“Ok! That’s it. I’ve decided.” 

Standing back up and heading right back out the door he just slinked through. 

It was Sunday anyway. Wasn’t this supposed to be the Lord’s day of no work? Didn’t that apply to the postmen too? 

Nobody would miss a day of mail.

//

The Inn was just the same as it was the last time I was here. It was dreary and low lit. It was practically empty.

An elderly looking Ellingboe manned the front check in, and like last time, she greeted Jesper with nothing more than a smile. 

_Oh goodie_ , Jesper thought snarkily, _“must have just missed the mad holiday rush of tourists and visitors.”_

He approached the desk, and slide to coins under his fingers towards her. One gold piece and one copper. A bath was only one gold piece. But the copper was to ensure his bath water would be fresh and clean. Unlike the first time when he was told his bath was ready, only to find out the bath was indeed ready. Ready with used water that had an odd brown-green sheen to it. 

Jesper almost fainted from the site nearly a year ago. 

An extra coin guaranteed clean water. 

The women scooped up his pieces, nodded and slowly, oh so slowly, turned to head up the creaky old stairs. She would be a while. 

Jesper sighed and leaned on the desk’s top with his elbows. He looked around the empty lobby. It was so quiet he could hear the wind outside. 

The only difference from the last time he was here and now was that there were no broken windows in the parlor area. The little lights that decorated the door frame to the other lobby room, caught Jesper’s eye. That was new. 

The little innkeeper just had felt the holiday spirit, along with everyone else, and spruced up the place a little. There was no Christmas tree, but the door frame also sported a green garnish framing, a few little red orbs dotted within it.

It wasn’t much, but it was nice. When Jesper stopped admiring the door frame, his eyes focused on what lay beyond the actual open entrance way. 

The bar. With Mogens sitting in the high top bar stool at it’s counter. A hot breakfast already half eaten before him. 

Jesper and Mogens’s eyes met. The older ferryman turned a side eye to the doorway, a touch of a scowl on this features. But when he saw who it was, he beamed with a genuine joyfulness. They called out to each other at the same time. One far more flabbergasted than the other. 

“WHAT!?  
“Postman!”

Mogens tipped the bill of his hat to Jesper as the postman stomped through the threshold, towards the bar, and towards him.

“You come all this way down here to deliver some mail to little ‘ol me?” 

“What are you doing here?!” 

“I’m sorry, am I not allowed on land anymore? It’s the office season, my friend! Ferry’s been docked for the next few days while I get to, hmmmm, linger here and there. Business is slow. But you already knew that, huh?”

_“What’s the rush, postman!? Christmas is over!!”_

Mogens gives the big bosomed barmaid a wink. She gives him a wicked smile back then eyes Jesper’s thin frame and frowns. Jesper frowns right back at her. 

Just because Smeerensberg wasn’t in a constant bloodbath of feuding families anymore, didn’t mean every person on the island had turned into perfect little angels. 

The children, yes.

The tired barmaid who had probably been on her feet since dawn while keeping Morgens entertained with ideal chit-chat, no. 

Jesper stars at Mognes as if he’s an apparition. When his sluggish brain (ah, here comes the pinpricks of an oncoming headache) can not only put together that Mogens of all people, was here of all places.

He’s so caught up at staring at Mogens like a dead fish, Mogens board of it already, that he’s too slow to react when the sailor slips his boot behind Jesper’s ankle and trips him to fall backwards. 

Jesper’s arms strike out, his hands scrambling to grab at the side of the bar to save himself. But his fallback wards is short, even though his heart races, flashbacks of yesterday flashing through his mind of falling into an unknown abyss that was the captain’s cabin.

His ass hits the edge of the empty bar stool in the row of empty seats at the bar. Mogen’s tripped him to sit down. Jesper shot him a glare, pouting up his lips in disapproval. 

Mogens’ smile is maddening.

“No mail purse I see! Perfect. You're off the clock I take it. Join me for a spell.” 

“Oh no-no-no, you're not turning me into one of your drinking buddies.”

Then in a much quieter tone, “Last night was more than enough, and don’t think it’s ever happening again.”

Mogens sticks out his bottom lip, a fake pout and hurt look in his sudden doll-like eyes. 

“Drinking? It’s 9 AM on God’s good day. Nobody’s drinking nothin’ of the sort.” 

Jesper looks down at the bar’s countertop and the plate before the captain. 

Every drop of liquor was behind the bar, all unpoured and in uncorked bottles out of the captain’s reach. Before him, instead, was a dinky floral painted tea pot, a cup that matched it, filled to the brim with tea and a thick lemon slice floating on top. Next to that was mug filled with coffee so thick it was may have been black tar.

Mogens was also enjoying a hearty breakfast of various bits of...everything. Some finely cut meats and cheeses. Jesper counted four perfectly orange yolks on the fried eggs that were on the side of a stack full of golden brown flapjacks. Scattered fruit decorated the rest of the plate. There was one more bowl, already half eaten of oatmeal with a slab of butter in the center of it, half melting into the oats. 

Despite the sight making Jesper’s mouth water, the wafting smells of fresh cooked breakfast was enough to make him roll his eyes into the back of his head with pleasure (why didn’t he think having a hot breakfast like this? Why did he have to get the cold sandwich he had to eat outside while Mogens’ enjoyed this hot feast instead this warm place).

To Jesper, there was just the tiniest bit of satisfaction to seeing the big heap that was Mogens’ food. 

All of it was a plate of very sobering foods. And as much as the big-mouth sea captain talked, he wasn’t impervious to the moonshine he guzzled down with Jesper it seemed. He must have been feeling the aftermath of it too. 

Good. 

Jesper hopped he felt like shit too. 

“Tea?” Mogens asks sweetly. He scoots his own cup over the counter towards his newly seated friend. 

“No. I’ll pass.” Jesper pushes off the bar and stands back up. He brushes invisible dirt off his uniform’s shoulder pads as he does. 

Mogens eyes the shiny gold buttons and how Jesper’s slender fingers move like paint brushes along the blue colored fabric. 

Mogens looks up at Jesper with a bit of an over the top pout. But he can’t find the smirk that breaks out from it and he tries to hide it behind the coffee mug he picks up and slurps at. 

The captain recalls him watching Jesper’s fingers twirl that pencil last night with the same grace. He wonders if he handled all objects with a “too rich too touch such lowly filth” flare. 

It made his hand gestures all the more interesting to watch closely. Almost pretty in their simple movements.

“Leaving so soon? Aw.”

“I’m here for personal reasons thank-you-very-much that are also none of your business and I don’t have time to waste with. MORE time. You’ve taken up quite a lot of it in the past evening as is.” 

“Is that why you ran away from the docks this morning like a lunatic set on fire?”

The younger man flushed but regained himself. 

“Of course. Just because you literally sit around all day doesn’t mean I don’t have very, very important royal post duties to attend to.” 

Jesper looked so dignified in that moment that Mogens’ almost became annoyed enough to tell him where he could shove it. All he offered was a few moments of company over a cup of tea after a night of friendly drinking.

It wasn’t in Mogens’ friendly nature to turn a cold shoulder towards anyone, not really, but if the Postman thought he turned his nose up at him, right as he thought he was actually warming up to, then Jesper had another thing coming. 

But Mogens rare rise of mild anger was swept away almost immediately at what he heard next. 

Sometimes Jesper thinks God likes to make him look like a fool on purpose because as he said this, nose stuck up in the air properly, the front desk women poked her head through the archway to the bar. 

“Mr. Johansson? Your bath’s ready.”

Mogens’ doesn’t laugh. Which was worse. Instead, he propped his elbow up on the bar and leaned his unshaven chin into the palm of his hand and that Goddamn smirk of his was truly something else.

Mogens’ didn’t have to laugh He didn’t have to say _anything_. Jesper was modified with embarrassment as it was. Saying something would ruin the pure humiliation that wrapped itself around Jesper’s frame. The lingering silence between them was so much WORSE than any smart remark could have been.

Jesper intakes a sharp breath of air through his nose. 

With all his will and might, he twists his toso back to smile at the women, smile so forced that he feels his teeth were about to shatter, and thanked her. 

_Don’t piss off the only place in town that can give you a hot bath. Don’t let -him- ruin this for you, Jespy._ Jesper repeats inside his head. 

“You know what, Postman. That sounds like a great idea! I think I’ll join you!” 

Jesper blinks. His mouth goes dry. The words that fell out of Morgens mouth weren’t words, they were just barn animal noises and it made no sense to him.

“What? What? Huh? Hmm? What did-Uh, what was that?” 

“Nora, darling, I think I’m going to take Mr. _Johansson’s_ inklings and order myself a bath too. On his tab.”

She snorts through her pretty nose.

“Sure. You want one made up out of bourbon or rye?”

“Hmmmm, how about a soak in some scotch. Ooooo that might be nice. What do you think, Mr. _Johansson_? You a scotch man? I myself am really more of gin type fellow. But you already knew that, huh?”

“Wait- my tab? What makes you think-”

“Surely you’ll treat me to such a divine joy as a thank you for harboring you last night during the perils of the unforgiving storm...?” 

Jesper sighs. He can hear his father’s voice in the back of his head; _Always repay a debt. It’s the true markings of a gentleman._

Is that what Jesper was? A gentleman? Had he ever even been one? He was just a postman in Smeerenburg. A “playboy” is what his father called him when he was cross with him in his past life.

Jesper’s lost in a train of thought he never thought about would cross his mind and he doesn’t feel Mogens hand slip inside his coat’s pocket before it’s too late.

The postman yelps out at the sudden connect, the brush of something he wasn’t expecting against the inside of his coat. Mogens is quick though, despite his size and when he pulls his hand back, there’s two gold coins in between his knuckles. Like the gold in his hands, he gives Jesper a friendly little wink. 

Before Jesper can grab at his own money and make a scene, Mogens’ had tossed the coins to the woman behind the bar. 

Jesper watches her slip the money into her bosom. They belonged to her now. He sagged his shoulders, feeling defeated for the second time this morning. 

“So kind you, Mr. _Johansson’s_. That should cover the breakfast and a bath with clean water, eh Nora? You,” he address Jesper again, “are welcome back on my boat any time you like! Rain or shine.” 

The captain’s thick arm slung itself over Jesper’s boney shoulders where he patted him tenderly on the arm. A friendly gesture to anyone who cared to look from afar. Jesper knew it was just another act of Mogens belittling him. 

He ducked and slipped out of Mogens’ hold, though the captain lets him go without a fuss, and turns back to Nora. He started up his chatter with her again, ignoring Jesper who headed back towards the staircase. 

It didn’t matter. Mogens’ didn’t matter. If all it took for Mogens to leave him be was two coins, then that was the price to pay. All that mattered now was the fact there was a filled hot bath waiting for him upstairs. 

//

Jesper moaned. 

He couldn’t help it. 

To be submerged in hot, steaming clear water, slowly and steadily, to literally feel all your worries and pain melt off your body into a mint leaf soaked soup of soap was like nothing else in this world. Possibly the greatest feeling in this whole world. 

Maybe seeing the way Margu’s face lit up in the Northern sun on the sled he and Klaus had built for her was a close second to this feeling.

Alright. Fine. After that. But nothing before that. There was literally no better feeling than this. 

Jesper was taught his whole life that men should fear God. But at moments in this type of bliss, he often wondered if God ever envied man on occasions.

….Was Mogens’ actually taking a ba- 

_No! What is wrong with you? You don’t care and you’re certainly not thinking about if he actually is._

Jesper takes a deep breath, his cheeks round out fully, and he slips himself under the surface of the water. 

He stays under for as long as his lungs would allow it before they start to burn. When he pops back up, his blond hair becomes flat and lengthy. 

Dammit. He just told himself not to think about Mogens, and now what’s swirling around in his head? That ugly mug and snaggle toothed grin. 

What did he shout at him this morning? 

_“What’s the rush, postman!? Christmas is over!!”_

He didn’t know why it bothered him as much as he had. Or why it kept repeating inside his head. 

Klaus and Jesper had a deal. Well, at first it was a deal. It became something...more later. The deal at the start was simple. Jesper needed the flux of letters from this Hell-hole of a town, and the kids of this town where more eager than ever to help him out once they caught wind that one letter to Mr. Postman equaled one toy from Mr. Klaus in return. 

Midnight runs were starting to take their toll on him, though Klaus seemed perfectly fine. Jesper remembers how warm the other man’s oversized hooded cloak looked and how cold he was with just his royal postal assigned uniform and scarf almost cause him hypothermia. 

Then the deal melted into a pastime. An enjoyable pastime, that neither of the two men wanted to admit at first. Klaus was slowly transforming into some sort of magician by then, from the mouths of babes, something from a fairy tale, and Jesper was just along for the ride.

It was fun. It also gave him meaning. His job out here was starting to mean something. For the town, for the kids, for himself and even Klaus. 

Jesper sank further into the hot water. Remembering the past was pleasant. Especially when all he thought about was the good times. 

He had a good time riding along with Klaus. Over the year, they had somehow became friends. 

Dare he think even...best friends. One of his favorite nights was when it just became too cold, too cold for Klaus to ignore Jesper’s clattering teeth. He sounded like an overworked nutcracker. Jesper remembered how Klaus handled the reins of the reindeer with ease, using one hand to guide them, while his other hand slipped around Jesper, pulling him close to his side. 

“Cold spells. They hit every now and then,” was all Klaus said when Jesper looked up at him. 

The next few days after, Klaus gifted him his own fur hooded huntsmen coat. 

Jesper stared at it in awe. It was a heavy, animals hide coat. Velvet to the touch and the fur on the inside was softer than any silk sheet he had ever ran his hand over. 

“You...you sow too!?” Jesper asked, amazed at the craftsmen ship 

“You don’t?” Klaus answered back with a glow to his cheeks.

Of course Jesper didn’t sow. Jesper couldn’t build either, as proof of his solo attempt to make Margu a sled. And he could barely cook. No wonder Jesper kept coming over to see Klaus. The company was great, but now that he thought about it, Klaus had fed and clothed him a lot during the last year. 

Klaus kept letting him into his home after all. The woodsmen must have secretly enjoyed taking care of the hopeless postman, too. He never turned him away. Even after Christmas was over.

But now that Christmas was over….

Letters still came. Where -still- coming. Just not as fast as before. Maybe because Jesper was no longer pushing the kids for it. Maybe because kids were happy with what they had. Klaus also needed the time to rest and make new toys come the new year, if he so wished, so there was no urgency any longer.

They spoke about it. Klaus and Jesper, about what to do after Christmas. Jesper still came by, either for a cup of coffee or just to chat, and every now and then they started talking about “now what”? As if it was a dangerous topic to bring up. 

What if Klaus clasped him on the back and bid him farewell, until sometime later like September? What if Jesper started to become home sick, really, truly, home sick?

What if- what if- what if. What now- what now - what now. There were too many to count. 

Jesper let himself slip so far into the tub only his nose hovered over the water’s surface. He breathed in deep. The innkeeper must have put in an extra clove of mint in here for him. 

Under the water, he frowns. 

What now indeed. 

New Years was just a few weeks ago. In a few months, Jesper could celebrate his one year anniversary of being the first ever postman in Smeerensburg to succeed. The first one ever to stay so long. He liked staying here.

Good Lord, did he just admit that? 

Was he having some sort of revelation in this bathtub, that he was going to stay? Indefinitely?

What did he have waiting for him at home? 

_Silk sheets?_ he thinks wittily, dryly, but that thought actually pricked at him. 

He had nothing to return to. 

A life of luxury his father had built for him and...nothing more. If he returned, his father certainly left the door open for him if he chose to, head held up and not crawling back, where would he stand? Would his dad make (lovingly suggest) to take up a post station somewhere in the city? 

Certainly. Where else. He could get a job, a comfy one too, at some government head’s office. Knowing his dad, now that his point was proven and Jesper thanked him that night on Mogens’ boat when he said he was proud of him, 

Jesper wonders for a quick second- Did Mogens hear any of their conversation? Knowing the eavesdropping-loving-scallywag, of course he did. 

Jesper’s grown remained and now he glared at his toes. Mogens was there probably during one of the most heartfelt moments he ever had with his father. 

That bastard. 

If he ended up staying here, he had a lot of Mogens to look forward to. But Klaus as well of course. And Alva. 

Funny how Alva was the only other blond in town. 

What did Mogens say last night? The townsfolk didn’t hate him. They just didn’t like him because he didn’t have a side to put stake into when it came to the fighting. Did the people of the town not like Alva when she first came here because of that too? 

By the time Jespers thoughts started to linger on Alva, the water was starting to turn lukewarm. How long had he been soaking? Jesper pulled his hands up. Yup. His fingers were pruning up nicely. 

He took a deep breath and dunked himself fully under. If he wanted to get his hair washed, it was now or never. 

He may have been thinking too much about it, but he swore his skin had the lingering scent of Mogens’ ship on him.  
He started to scrub. 

// 

Jesper didn’t see Morgens after he got dressed and ventured back down to the front desk of the inn. He was honestly half expecting him to be lingering outside his door, or back in the bar, or even at the desk itself, waiting for him. 

But no. The bar was utterly empty and the front desk just had it’s permanent fixture of that old women, idling, waiting for new guests. 

Jesper breathed a sigh of relief. He hated to admit it, but Mogens had a sharp tongue on him, and it always made Jesper feel like a fool when he couldn’t think of something equally smart to snap back at him when the captain would through a jolly little insult his way. 

His brain right now was still too muddled from the drinking. But it was also not jelly from the hot bath. 

He felt great. And he was happy that Mogens wasn’t here to ruin that happy feeling. 

With a tip of his hat to the innkeeper, he made his way back to his post office. 

//

Alva was sitting on his porch steps when Jesper came down the hill.

“Alva?” he called out to her, 

“Finally! Where have you been?” Alva didn’t look too amused but her features softened when Jesper picked up his pace to come closer. They embraced, but she was quick to pull back, tucking a strand of her hair behind her ear. She did that when she was nervous or in deep thought. 

She looked like she was both. Both in deep thought and that was causing her to be nervous. She tapped her pointed chin with a fisted hand. 

“Are you alright? What’s the matter? Aren’t you supposed to be teaching Sunday school right now?”

“Well, yes, that’s why I came. I mean, that’s not WHY I came here. I mean I was teaching. But then I came here. I came here because well it’s Sunday, and I was at school-”

Jesper took her arm in his hand carefully and lead her into his post office. She rambled in short sentences when she had too many thoughts in her head. 

“Alva, what’s wrong?” 

“Klaus.”

Jesper’s heart didn’t skip a beat. It pounded twice as fast at the mention of Klaus’ name after the phrase of “what’s wrong?”

Jesper was about to become a babbling mess himself, asking her all the questions, all at once. The two of them together in an emergency situation wouldn’t be the best. They were both too emotional. Alva, too much brain to think casually and calmly, Jesper too much heart to think rationally and logically. 

“We were supposed to meet him in the woods today. The kids, I mean, us. “We”, me and the kids-”

“He was? You where?-”

“-I begged him for weeks, I wanted it to be a surprise. I was going to tell you later, or today rather. He agreed to come show the kids lay of the land. You know, have the local woodsmen teach them about the woods-

“What? When? Why?-”

“Jesper, please! I’m trying to tell you that he never showed up. We were all going to meet up near the edge of town, past the halfway point from town and his cabin. I thought maybe because of that crazy storm last night, he got water logged. But then I saw all the black ice all over town-Jesper wait. Wait, what are you doing?”

Jesper rushed past her without another thought and out the door. He jumped over the porch steps and whistled as loud as he could through his fingers.

Stamps came clip-clopping from around the corner of the house, obeying the postman's call. He grabbed her reigns and hastily attached her to his carriage. Alva followed him out the door and down the steps of the porch, helping him get up into the carriage.

“What are you going to do?”

“Go find him, what else?”

Alva looked out toward the hill. 

“I should come.”

“You should. But if I don’t come back, then what?”

She nodded. There were only two people who cared to whatever happened to him here on this island, and one of them was missing. If Alva went with him now and something went wrong, well...

“If you’re not back by tonight, I’m gathering an angry mob to come find you two.”

Jesper raised any eyebrow at her.

“Ok, well, maybe not angry,” she corrected herself, then looked up at him right as he was about to snap his horse’s reins. 

“Please. Please, please be careful.” 

He nodded and couldn’t waste one more second before he sent Stamps into a gallop up the hill. Jesper were out of Alva’s eyesight before she could yell “good luck” after him.

//

Barreling through down the road from the post office was easy. Jesper’s station was at the end of a cliff, right outside the town. There was only a dirt path that lead up and down a few hills for a good stretch before you hit the town’s main road. 

It was when he did hit the main towns road did he have to slow Stamps down from a run to a quick trot. 

It was already late in the afternoon and the town’s people were now crowding the streets. 

Jepser grinded his teeth. Some of the people came up to him, his carriage was open after all, asking him about their letters from yesterday or just asking him how he was doing. 

Sometimes this town could be too polite…

He had to shoo them off, urging Stamps forward without stopping.

Finally the crowd seemed to get the hint and stayed back from the postman who seemed to be in a rushed hurry somewhere. Jesper saw his path clear up and he almost sent Stamps running again but was denied his speedy get away.

Because fucking Mogens had to pop up again, crossing the damn street like he owned the town, and getting in front of Stamps, acting suprised by seeing Jesper, _again_. 

“Mr. < _Johansson_! What a lovely surprise. You know, if I didn’t know any better, I would think you were following me around.” He was now blocking his path on purpose.

He stood in front of Stamps, laying a fingerless gloved hand on her crest. Giving her a good scratch he looked up at Jesper, lazily smile in place. 

He was freshly shaven, Jesper noticed through the angry haze that was rising in him. He really did take a bath. 

Christ. 

Jesper gathered himself, he was ready to run him over if he had to, but instead of yelling at him to get out of his way, Jesper suddenly got an idea. 

In the worse case that Klaus was hurt, Jesper could use some help. It was a crazy idea, but he figured maybe Mogens would be a decent human being for once and help him without much convincing or expecting anything in return. 

“Mogens! Get in! Now! Go, go, go, come on, get up here.” Jesper ordered him urgently. 

Mogens raised a bushy eyebrow at him but didn’t drag out the questions he had forming. Maybe because when he actually looked up at Jesper, he could see the young man was in no teasing mood but looked rather distressed. 

Rounding over to the right of the carriage, Mogens grabbed at the metal frame work and hoisted himself up. The carriage swayed at his added weight and before he could settle in properly, wanting to ask what had the postman so spooked, Jesper whipped Stamps as hard as he could and yelled out “YAW!”.

In this case, there would be no convincing. Jesper didn’t give him the chance to even hear him out. 

Mogens was nearly thrown out of the seat from the sudden jerk of motion. He had to steady both his hat and his himself as Jesper charged through the town square and up the rest of the way out of town. 

“Whoa!” Mogens yelled out, “Whoa! Where are you- oof!” 

But Jesper paid him no mind and when they hit random rocks or dips in the road, all Mogens could do was hang on for dear life. 

If this was some strange ‘pay back’ from this morning’s paid breakfast, he was going to regret it if the bumping was kept up my longer. 

They kept going. Jesper kept whipping Stamps, and the mare kept picking up speed. The town was behind them now and they were approaching the trail that lead into the mountains and hills of the forest. 

At seeing this, Morgens self state of preservation kicked in. The winding road up the cliff side was just up ahead. 

“Jesper! Stop! Jesper!!”

Mogens grabbed at the reigns and overpowered Jesper’s hold on them easily. He wretched the leather straps out of the blond man’s hands, and yanked them back as hard as he could. He 

“What are you doing?!”

“ME? What are you doing!? Are you trying to get us killed!?” Mogens yelled back, both angry and surprised, somehow still keeping an airiness to his tone even though he was trying to be angry. 

Now he was trying to catch his breath. His beating heart was threatening to break his rib cage, he swore it. He ran his hand over his face, dragging his fingers over his flesh like clay. 

He stared openly at Jesper, demanding an explanation. 

But Jesper said nothing. He only tried to reach for the reins again.

“Nothing doing,” Mogens said, pulling the straps out to the side, out of Jesper’s reach. 

“Mogens! We don’t have time!”

“Have you gone nuts? What don’t we have time for? What are you talking about?”

Jesper gave up trying to wrestle the reins out of the other man’s grasp. 

“Klaus!” was all he shouted as if that would explain everything and Mogens would understand. 

“What about him?”

Jesper threw his hands in the air. 

“Somethings wrong with him. He was supposed to come to meet with Alva, but he didn’t. So something must be wrong. And with the storm last night maybe something went wrong while he was traveling down here and I didn’t see him yesterday because of you and I don’t know if he’s ok of where he is or what to think and I need your help in case he is hurt because I can’t do it myself if he is and you-”

Mogens held up his hand, patting at the air for Jesper not only calm down but take a breath. He stumbled over all that in one gulp of air. 

“Ok, listen. I think I caught the tail end of that. But I’m going to tell _you_ right now, that if you send that little filly into a break neck speed of a run like that over a winding cliff side road covered in black ice, you’ll have us in a ditch with broken necks like that,” he snaps his fingers to allude to their neck snapping with just as much ease. 

Jesper’s eyes are wide and his fine light brown eyebrows stitch together in horror at the image.

“Horses hooves slip on black ice like butter on a hot skillet. Don’t you know that? No traction. And with a carriage on her back, it’ll just spook her out of control off the road. Or off the whole damn canon ridge.”

Jesper can see it now; Stamps unable to get proper footing, her long legs slipping from under her all while panicking to keep running before gravity over takes her and flips her and the two of them over. And Mogens’ was right. They were already on the curving mountain side. They would go right off the edge if Stamps struggled enough. 

Klaus and Jesper already had one almost fatal scare like that in failed ambush. He thought it was terrifying to be dragged out of control by six panicked reindeer and off a sloped incline. How they lived, he still wasn’t sure. 

But he had no interest in experiencing what a two hundred foot death drop onto more ice and rocks would feel like with a screaming horse and Mogens at his side instead of Klaus. No thank you. 

“Let’s just take it nice and easy, eh? We’ll get there when we get there. But we won’t get there at all if you drive like a lunatic. Right? Right.” 

Mogens doesn’t give Jesper back the reins yet. He gives Stamps a LIGHT whip, the reins just barely jostling her, and after a moment of catching her own breath, the mare flips her hair and starts to walk at a normal, steady pace up the road. 

They move slowly. Too slowly. Jesper tries to convince Mogens to go a little faster, but the heavy set man shakes his head. In fact, he changed his mind. He wasn’t going to give Jesper back the reins at all. 

Instead the ferryman wraps the leather straps around his forearm, the one furthest from Jesper’s side, and kicks his feet up so he could recline back. It’s not lost on Jesper that this moment almost mirrors the very first day he came to this island, and Mogens played ‘tour guide’ with him.

It was a long ride. So much longer because when Stamps did hit the black ice, which there was plenty off, she DID slip. Even at walking speed, she neighed in panic and it took Morgens a steady trained hand to maneuver her more than once to keep her balance and keeping pushing forward. 

Fear tightened around Jesper’s heart every time she caught the next batch of ice and almost slipped. As much as he didn’t want to admit it, he had to...he wouldn’t have known what to do if Mogens wasn’t here. Would he had fallen off the cliff side had he propelled Stamps forward at light speed without a second thought? 

He wanted to ask Mogens where he learned to handle a horses’ reins like that. But he couldn’t. If he suddenly got too chatty with the other man, he had this spin tingling feeling something really bad was going to happen to Klaus...if it hadn't already. 

This all felt like punishment for Jesper taking the day off to drink a little and then lounge around in a bath instead of working...

Jesper started to fidget. He gripped the underside of the seat, steadying himself. He threw a nasty glare at Mogens, not knowing what else to do. But the large man can’t see it. He had his captain’s hat pulled over his eyes. Jesper wasn’t even sure he wasn’t asleep. 

“Why aren’t you worried?” Jesper said. 

“Kid, listen- 

“Don’t call me that.

Mogens thumbs up the bill of his cap. He looks over at Jesper, dully. 

“Alright. _Sunshine_ , listen, I don’t know if you are privy to this information or not, but Klaus, the giant woodsmen? The very capable and sturdy big fellow? You know the one. With the big white beard? He’s been living up in those woods for decades -by himself- long before you got here,” Mogens says with far too much authority his tone had any right to have while he leaned back easily. 

Jesper didn’t look convinced. 

“This isn’t his first Scary Rain and it won’t be his last.”

“ _Scary Rain _?” Jesper echos back like a simpleton, slack-jawed. Mocking.__

__“If you think the town’s folk of Smeerensburg are more creative than that to come up with a better name for a category six thunder storm, then you would be wrong,” Mogens says a matter of factually and settles back into his comfortable slouch._ _

__He nestled down deeper into the seat. His wide hands rested on his chest, fingers interlacing with one another. He jerks his head forward, a movement that’s been practiced and has become almost mechanical, and his hat slips back right over his eyes, just so._ _

__The road felt fine. Stamps was already getting used to the ice and walked even slower when she felt like she as approaching it._ _

__Jesper has nothing to say and stares ahead miserably._ _

__A long silence falls between them. Only sound shared between the two men were Stamps’ rhythmic hoof beats, soft clinks of metal, the old wood turning at the wheels of the carriage and Jesper’s sighing. He can’t seem to stop or get his forehead to unwrinkle from pure worry._ _

__His boyish and immature imagination was making whatever was in his head, the absolute worst case scenario with Klaus possible, well, _worse _.___ _

____Mogens’ placed a hand on his shoulder without tilting his hat off his eyes._ _ _ _

____“He’s fine. I promise.”_ _ _ _

____Jesper shakes his head and breaths. He can’t seem to get his forehead to unwrinkle._ _ _ _

____He hopes Mogens was right. Because if he wasn’t, and Klaus was hurt, and they were too late to help...Oh God. Jesper swore he was going to throw the boatman off the side of the cliff himself if was wrong._ _ _ _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope that I conveyed the idea that Jesper started the ‘no mail on Sunday thing’ At least where he lives, ha. But historically by the early 20th century, new technologies such as the telegraph, the telephone, and the train, had reduced people's urgent reliance on the Postal Service. Besides the religious aspect of the church folk wanting more people to attend Sunday mass instead of working, people where just tired, man! Seven day work weeks suck. 
> 
> Klaus feels like it takes place in the 1880ish time. In 1879 Thomas Edison made electricity usable for the common folk, and cars weren’t invented until 1886. Since Jesper rides a horse everywhere and there were no cars in the city, but Smeerensburg’s turns on the Christmas lights during their little market on ice part, it must be between those years. And of course nobody has a phone in Smeerensburg. 
> 
> Thank you for coming to my fanfiction timeline TedTalk.


	3. One For Me, One For You

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'll be beta editing this chapter after I post it only because if I don't get it up now, I won't get it up until 2020. Holiday family madness and what not. I had to sneak away into the tool shed so I could at least spell check this sucker. My mother thinks I've picked up smoking and I just don't want anyone to see... the things I do for my readers. <3
> 
> Anywho! Enjoy! I hope everyone is enjoying the last week of 2019. See you in 2020!

“I’ve sat around some sad sacks in my day, but you’re starting to upset even me,” the boatman said.

He had to say something. The stretch of silence between himself and Jesper had been dragging on and on for much too long. 

Jesper looked like an old war widow, shawl clasped in white knuckled boney hands while longingly looking out the window. Sad eyes set and unblinking over the hillside, waiting for her children to return from beyond at any moment. 

It was cute at first, Mogens would admit, but now it was starting to kill even his spirits. Jesper kept scanning the snow banks and old mountain trail like a faithful bloodhound. He couldn’t decide if he wanted to stay worried or hyper alert. 

He would grab Mogens' arms, yanking him to the side to get his attention. He would point, “Look! There!” at every oversized branch that had fallen during the Big Storm. It must had been Klaus! 

No wait, every large boulder in the shadows of a tree was Klaus! Jesper squinted out into the white washed snowy landscape. He even mistook an actual bear for Klaus, which Mogens' remarked wasn’t too far off and laughed. 

Jesper felt like an idiot when the strolling large animal looked over at them and then disappeared behind a patch of thick trees. 

Mogens very unhelpfully added, “Even if Klaus did manage to knock himself off his sleigh and thrown to the side of the road, out cold, we wouldn’t find his body. Bears like that like to drag men off into their caves to eat if they find them lying around.”

He thought he was hilarious. Jesper thought he was going to swoon at the thought of Klaus getting ripped apart by some predator our here in the woods. 

“Doesn’t even have to be a bear,” Mogens kept going once he saw how white Jesper became (which was saying something. The ghostly blond Dutch man was even less pigmented than most of the folks in Smeenrsberg) 

“There’s mountain lions here too. Wolves. Huge foxes. Heck, a bull-elk is even worse. Ever see a man stomped and gouged to death? I have. Ooof! Not a pretty way to go.” 

His laughter, already strained, died when Jesper either recoiled at the bad humor or glared out of principle. He either wasn’t listening, ignoring Mogens, or took every word to heart, manifesting every scenario into reality in his head. 

What if, what if, _what if_.

Mogens sighed loudly next to him.  
“Oh I’m just kidding. Bulk up. Smeeenrsberg doesn’t even gave bull elk. They live in the United States of America. Ever been?” He lightly elbowed Jesper in the side. 

No reaction. No answer. 

Mogens frowned. His fingers fiddled with the reins wrapped around his hand that he was playing keep away with Jesper. 

The ride went on, slow and steady, silent and still. Tree branches kept snapping and falling to the ground, making a soft _thud_ in the ever-present banks of snow. The ice that formed from the rain made everything too heavy. 

No wild life made noise. That was something Jesper noticed. There was usually something stirring, or at least birds chirping. Now only the wind that dragged across the ground and behind the carriage. 

They crossed the planks of the lone bridge that was the last connecting string in the mountains that separate Klaus’ isolated home and the rest of the island’s town folk. This part made Mogens sit up straight. He told himself not to peer down, but he did.

They were crossing one plank at a time, Stamps taking two steps and then stopping to get her hooving. The carriage dipped between the space of the planks. Enormous icicles had formed under the planks and swayed with every movement the carriage above them made. 

Mogens’ ‘eeeh’ed nervously. That was quite an impressive death drop beneath them. 

_Clop clop. Thunk. Clop clop. Thunk. Clop clop. Thunk._

Two more planks and they would be on the other cliff side. 

Jesper snorted unkindly at the captain. 

“Never took you for such a scaredy cat,” Jesper says. 

Mogens raised his eyebrows and narrowed his eyes at him when they finally made it to the other side. 

“Not all of us have nerves of steel like you, Postman. You know what they say, ‘Only fools don’t get scared’”. 

Jesper huffed. He knew he shouldn’t rise to the bait, but Mogens damn smirk was just so irritating. It was his personal punchline to everything he said, like it was a reward for having the last word.  
Which was always.

But not this time. Jesper thought of the perfect comeback. Oh it was so good. It was going to really put the other man in his place and make him think twice about the next time he opened his big stupid mouth to make a jape at Jesper. 

Jesper even began to wag his finger at him, feeling rather sly himself, a devilish smirk of his own cutting into his face. 

Mogens saw this expression too, turning his head to face him, challenging him to say whatever he had concocted right to him, eyes locking, each of their one eyebrows cocking. 

Jesper’s lips formed the first sound, “You-” then his hand dropped. As did his face, smirk wiped away as his mouth slightly fell open. Color drained from him as he stood bolt up in the still moving carriage. 

Mogens’ own expression flattered, a slight “huh?” coming from him, confused at Jespers sudden and strange antics. If this was still part of his come back, he was very baffled to where it was leading. 

Jesper eyes wide, darting rapidly back and forth, pinned onto something that lay within the forest tree line.

Mogens followed his gaze but didn’t have time to fully turn and look over his shoulder before Jesper yelled out, leaping _over_ Mogens and out of the stagecoach faster than an a fox hopping just out of reach of a bear trap’s teeth. 

“Klaus!” 

Mogens’ heart clenches. Jesper’s already crawling over a snowy bank where Mogens sees Klaus too. Or the unmistakable broad back and shoulders of the woodsman, slack against a tree’s trunk a few feet into the line of trees. 

“Klaus! Klaus!” Jesper yells as he scrambles over to the man that appeared to have fallen over. Mogens swears under his breath, pulling Stamps to a halt and getting out of the cart himself, following in Jesper’s deeply intended footsteps in the tall snow covered ground. 

Jesper’s so fast that when he reaches Klaus, he grabs onto Klaus’ shoulder and practically slingshots himself around him like a child on oiled up skates, whizzing around to Klaus’ front.

What was Klaus doing out here? Did he fall over? Did an upturned root catch his boot and before he could catch himself, his head hit the trunk he was leaning against? Did his reindeer run off or did he come alone? How long had he been out here?! 

Mogens thinks the worst. He thinks Klaus isn’t hurt. He thinks he’s dead. Either from hyperthermia, the woodsman was no spring chicken, and a death chill to the bones out in the still wet and snow-covered woods be do him in easily. Especially if he’s been sitting in the three feet of snow for hours now. 

But when Jesper stands before him, both his hands gripping at Klaus with so much strength, his who arms start to shake, the blond man yelling his name over and over again, Klaus jumps at the sudden appearance of everyone’s favorite postman before him.

“Klaus?!” Jesper finally yells out in disbelief when Klaus’ eyes snap open in fright. Blue orbs dart all over, panicked at first, until his vision focus on Jesper’s huffing and red splotched, heavy puffs of breath pushing out of him, his chest heaving. 

“Jesper? Wha-” He stands up. Jesper doesn’t step back, doesn’t let go, but he’s too short too have his hands stay on Klaus’ shoulders. They slid down to his chest, pushing back to test Klaus’ physical form. 

Was he really there? Or was Jesper just imagining him in some sort of fever panic? 

Klaus’ hears a pair of extra footsteps coming up behind him as well, crunching in the snow and he looks over to see Mogens trailing up to his side as well.

“Captain Mogens,” Klaus greets cheerfully enough. Mogens bobs his head at him in greeting.

“Klaus.”

“Hey! Hey, ignore him. Are you ok? What are you doing out here?”

Klaus considers a few things, in that stoic, steady and calm manner of his. He blinks, hearing the words, raises his bushy white eyebrows a bit at the meaning of those words and then looks up.

“I’m fine? And I...live here.You know that,” he finished with a careful laugh. He points to a few trees and sure enough, that cabin log home, barn and stable that Jesper knew so well, could be seen in between the slots of the trees. 

Jesper hadn’t noticed in his pointless jeering at Mogens that Stamps had carried them just a few more yards away from him home. The world darkened his vision the moment he saw Klaus. 

“But...wha-what are you doing out here? I was calling your name from the road, you were slumped over the tree.” 

“Oh! Ho, ho, I must have fallen asleep to be honest. I’m actually out here with Inga. One of the Saami women. She asked if I knew where there were black berries. She wanted to make a pie so I brought her out here. She must be around her somewhere. Though I’m afraid she has had me out here for too long. I must have sat down on this here log and dozed off and ended up leaning against the tree.”

“Berries...pie...dozed off…” Jesper repeated the words as if Klaus had just made them up and he was hearing them for the first time.

Jesper takes his hand off Klaus. He shakes his head, trying to loosen the cotton fluff between his ears. 

“Alva! You were supposed to meet her today for some school, uh...um, thing?”

At this Klaus’ looks surprised. He thinks about it for a moment. 

“Goodness, was that today!” He slapped the heel of his palm to his forehead.

“Ms. Alva sent the Postman up here thinking you slipped on some black ice and broke your neck,” Mogens interjected, feeling a bit too ignored now. 

Klaus tilts his head at him.

“From the Scary Rain?” He says it almost offended, as if he wouldn't know how to take care in a rainfall, let alone a specific one to Smeerensberg where he had lived his whole life. 

“I can’t believe I missed the meeting Alva. And the children! They must be so disappointed.” He ran a hand down his long white beard. He put a hand on his hip, bowing at his own self defeat, head still shaking in disbelief that something like that would slip his mind. 

“My days must have shifted after you didn’t show up a few nights ago, Jesper.” He says kindly, even though Jesper felt like he was getting deliberately blamed for both not showing up and now causing Klaus to lose track of time and miss his randevu with Alva. 

All three men’s attention shifted when the Saami women Klaus mentioned steps from behind some rustling bushes, a flat open woven basket slung over her forearm, over filled with black berries, comes out of the brush and towards them. She smiles at Jesper and raises an eyebrow at the other man she’s never seen before. 

But if he was standing with the other two, he must have been alright. She fixes her large hat straight, brushing off leaves and little twigs that cause on it’s tall top. 

“Dit zou voldoende moeten zijn. Laten we terug gaan. Het is te koud.”  
(This should be enough. Let's go back. It's starting to get cold.) 

Klaus and the other two stared at her openingly and watched her as she brushed past them and back up the path to Klaus’ home. 

Klaus shrugs at Jesper in a gesture of ‘I don’t know what she said either, but it looks like we should follow’. 

“Come. We’ll all go drink some cider the others made before I grab a reindeer and make my way back to town. I will have to go seek out Alva and apologizes to her for today. Captain Mogens, please, join us. Did Alva send you here as well?”

Mogens said ‘nope’ and hooked his thumbs over the top of his thick black belt 

“Jesper here thought I could help dig your snow covered body out of the trenches if we happened to come across it.”

Jesper stared at Mogens in open horror. The bastard’s smile was unwavering. There was a pause and then Klaus threw his head back and laughed, deep. The only other time he did that was when Jesper made him laugh with stories of him being ‘magical’ and ‘flying reindeer’. 

He gives Jesper a well meant pat on the back when his belly laughs settled, one-two more ‘ho ho’s. 

“I’m sorry if I gave you a fright, my friend,” he said, smiling down at Jesper and then inclined his head for them to follow him as he followed up behind Inga. 

“Guess you’re not such a fool after all,” Mogens says as he steps up to Jesper’s side. 

“This is where you point and laugh hysterically at me.”

“Why? I thought he was dead too.” 

// 

Jesper felt...odd. 

Klaus had invited Mogens into his home. 

Mogens. 

Inside Klaus workshop. 

It was...odd. 

When Jesper brought Alva here only recently, it felt right. 

Or at least it felt...well…-No.

‘Right’ was the right word. 

Showing Alva Klaus, the man responsible for bringing joy and cheer to the town folk, and his beautiful workshop, the reindeer, even seeing the Saami in action all under Klaus’ roof (as Alva was the one that helped Márgu and Jesper communicate in the first place so that their friendship could bloom) it all felt like showing her the fruits of her labor. 

Just as she showed Jesper’s his fruits of love, unknowingly, by pulling him down to the frozen over sea, and watching neighbors that only a few days ago where trying to drive pitchforks into each other's eye sockets were now singing carols side by side, holding hands, and sharing a cup of coco with one another. 

Mogens was out of place here. At least it certainly felt like he was. 

What did the bitterly sarcastic sea captain have to bring to the table here? Nothing. Mogens didn’t have children (Thank God, Jesper thought, they would have been little terrors), so he couldn’t give two spits about toys. He certainly didn’t care about bringing happiness and joy to town or making it a better place. 

Granted, though, Jesper remembered what he said below the deck on his boat, he didn’t have a stake in the towns fight. He didn’t have to keep up the Krums honor or carry around the Eillingboes pride. He seemed perfectly content going back and forth, back and forth, back and forth between the main land and here for the rest of his life not having any contact with anyone. It seemed to suit him just fine. 

What did Mogens want for caring for his fellow man? 

_What did you? Before you got a good deal out of it..._

_Jesper told the voice inside his head to shut up but then quickly added, a come back to himself, _I changed for the better_. _

_There were only a few Saami in the workshop once they stepped inside. Only a few bursts of reds and blues dotting the side open space._

_Now that Christmas was over, they went home. But not before promising that they would love to continue this tradition of helping each other out and coming back next year._

_They told Jesper and Klaus they were welcome to their home as well. Margu double promised that before her parents bid them farewell and tracked their way back home. The few that stayed wanted to help tidy up. Some of the women just liked baking for Klaus and fussed and cleaned over little things. A few men wanted to make sure there were no more heavy things to left and stayed to eat the baked treats as well._

_Jesper couldn’t decide if it was good luck or a shame that Margu wasn’t here to meet Mogens. But at least Mogens was behaving. Jesper, God dammit, couldn’t hold back the mousey smile that bloomed on his face as he watched Mogens take it all in for the first time._

_So much like Alva. There was pure wonderment on his usual dull and tired face. Though he kept his hands inside his sailor’s coat pockets._

_Mogens brought out one hand to tip the bill of his hat up and whistled impressively at the size of it all. The high ceilings, the carefully crafted blue prints on the walls (he liked those a lot), the open tables with neatly assorted tools, the side windows that let in the natural sunshine. All of it struck a chord in him. He nodded in approval of it all._

_He may not personally care for toys, but if he could admire the craftsmanship of a geared up carousel, with masterly painted dancing horses, or the perfectly sewn stuffed animal with shined black button eyes that even made _him_ go ‘awww.’_

_He caught Jesper watching him. He may have turned a bit pink in the cheek._

_“What? It’s cute.”_

_Jesper rolled his eyes._

_“Come on, I’ll show you the upstairs. That’s where he keeps all the kites and flying bird toys,” he said it as if it was something boring, but he was pleased Mogens seemed interested._

_“An upstairs, huh? Lead the way.”_

_//_

_The upstairs was just as grand as the lower floor and Mogens kept nodding at everything. He more frequently started to mutter on his breath either ‘would you look at that’ or ‘oh this is very nice’._

_When they came down the spiral staircase, Jesper was boosting about his paint job on a few of the birds, the red ones with the gold beaks were the best ones, naturally, because he did them._

_“You like birds?” Mogens asked once they reached the bottom._

_“Nah, Klaus wife did when she was alive.”_

_He said it so quickly that when the words had long left his mouth, he slapped a hand over his face and almost ran into Klaus standing at the arch way, a tray of glasses and treats before him._

_Jesper froze. Mogens looked at how he shook._

_“Captain Mogens, you remember my Lydia.”_

_“Yup. God rest her soul. Great little lady. Didn’t know she liked birds though. Ooh, is that cider spiked? Mind if I…?” Mogens paid Jesper gaffed expression no attention and instead reached for a little flask inside his coat pocket. He made the little silver flask peek his head out, waving it at Klaus before the large man smiled and nodded in permission._

_Mogens would have slipped into his cider even if Klaus didn’t approve, but this way he was open to sharing._

_“You-you knew? He knew? YOU knew? You told him? I thought-. But. Secret? HE knew?”_

_“What part of ‘Klaus has been here longer than you have,’ do you refuse to understand, Postman? One tended to notice when an angel would flutter into town, dodging the axes and arrows, to pick up some oats and sugar once every few months.”_

_Mogens took a glass of cider in one hand and popped open his flask with his thumb in his other. He looked up at the high windows and tried to recall something else. One eye squinted when his memory failed him._

_“I took you two to the mainland for something once….”_

_“Our wedding.”_

_“Oooo right, right, right. Now THAT was the prettiest little bride I ever did see.”_

_Klaus smiled proudly at the compliment._

_“Mr. Salvings never could latch her onto that horse, could he?”_

_They both laughed at a private joke from decades ago. Jesper felt horrifically shunned out from knowing what it meant._

_But he wasn’t going to let it show. He smiled along._

_“Jesper, I told you about that, hadn’t I?”_

_Jesper perks up at finally being noticed again._

_“Hmm? Oh? What? Hmm? Oh that the boatman and you and your wife were so close he was practically the ring bearer and your best man at the same time at your wedding? Nope, uuhh, no that conversation didn’t quit pass between us unless it was when I was knocked out cold after I fell head first down a Krum chimney. Must have slipped my mind.”_

_Jesper looked at his feet. Klaus and Mogens gaped at him, wide eyed. They both cracked up at the same time, both their large hands clasping the back of Jesper’s back, almost knocking the thin man to the floor._

_“Jesper’s the only one that can make me laugh like this,” Klaus says between hoots.  
“It must be the way he grew up in the city. Such a quick mind! Always leaving me scratching my head.” _

_“Wouldn’t know,” Mogens says and winks at Jesper as he gives his cup of cider a healthy dose of whatever sloshed around in his flask._

_Klaus hands Jesper his own cup, who takes it mechanically. He’s too slow to stop Mogens from tipping his flash into his own cup. By the time the clear liquid is poured in all Jesper can do, without spilling the whole damn thing and making a mess for Klaus to clean up, was try to lift it out of Mogens reach repeating ‘nononononono no! No! Gah!’_

_Klaus takes the lead and they follow him into the cozy den, fire always lit in front of his massive wooden throne. Mogens has no complains when he settles down onto the plush bear skin rug before the fire, hiking one knee up._

_They chit chat about how much Mogens likes the red painted birds upstairs. Klaus settles into his chair, picking his feet up to rest on the little stump by the fire. He nods along. Those were some of his favorite too._

_Jesper wasn’t listening. He just sipped his now-too-spiked cider and stared unblinking into the fire as he took his seat next to Mogens, at Klaus side._

_//_

_Klaus at some point had gotten up and Jesper completely hadn't noticed. Not until Mogens nudged his shoulder with his own._

_“For someone who’s head nearly came unscrewed from worry for Klaus, you sure are giving him the cold shoulder now.”_

_Jesper glared at the accusation without taking his eyes off the fire. But when he turned around, Mogens had a point. Klaus was gone, his empty cup of cider the only clue left behind on the chair’s armrest to prove he was ever even there._

_“I didn’t know you were friends with Klaus. I didn’t think anyone really knew he was even up here,” Jesper said, not looking up at Mogens, easing himself back towards the warm amber glow._

_He didn’t notice the side eye gaze Mogens was casting upon him, eyes focusing on a certain spot on his neck before he too turned his attention to the fires._

_“‘Friends’ is a generous word. Besides, I’m the one that told you he was even here in the first place, remember?”_

_Oh Jesper remembered. That was the day he thought he was going to get decapitated by some crazed old woodsmen who had a collection of toys - from all the kids he chopped up and scattered in the woods, naturally, obviously._

__Oh the woodsmen cabin? You should go visit! Really nice fella. Loves visitors._ _

_“You sent me up here, a day of travel in the dark, freezing weather, knowing Klaus was some silent reclusive that was going to kick me off his property, just like the rest of the town.”_

_“And yet you somehow got that sad reclusive man to become...that,” he took another sip from his cup. “Now that’s something you’ll have to tell me in detail one day.”_

_The blond man turned to him, jabbing a finger in his direction. “You tell me how you knew Lydia _first_.”_

_Mogens eyed him cautiously._

_“Why does that sound like a challenge, postman?”_

_Jesper blinked. He lowered his hand and then waved Mogens off._

_“Nevermind.”_

_“Ooooooooooo I seeeeee. Am I sensing some good ol’...jealousy, Mr. Johansson? A bit of irritation because your dear buddy Klaus dared to have some kind of life before your daddykins sent you off to the middle of nowhere to teach you a lesson?”_

_“No!”_

_Damn, he was too quick to shout that out. He snapped his attention back to the fires. Mogens went on._

_“Oh good! Because after Lydia died and his life was practically ruined to the point I thought he hung himself up here after I didn’t see him for nearly a decade in town, I’m glad that you stepped in out of the kindness of your heart and brought some sense of happiness and purpose back into him, only to get upset by the fact that I may have seen him once or twice back when he had color in his short hair. Because that sure would be a silly thing to get jealous over, wouldn’t, Postman?”_

_Jesper hunched into himself closer, eyebrows scrunched together so tightly he was giving himself a headache._

_“I-”_

_“Yesss?”_

_“I!”_

_“Yessssss?? Hmmm? Go on.”_

_Jesper said nothing._

_Mogens said nothing._

_The fire spit at them._

_A silver flask came into Jesper’s side view. Mogens offering it to him wordlessly._

_He took it in nimble fingers and threw back his head, taking a solid clear gulp._

_“I’ve never had a-” he trails off._

_“In the city-” Jesper's words can’t seem to form what he wants to say without sounding like a fool. He had always been a smooth talker. A great deal maker. He practically tricked a whole town into helping him meet his own goal of getting those 6,000 letters…_

_Why was it so hard to form a cohesive thought when Morgens was around. The larger man intimidated him, maybe. Not like Klaus did - had done._

_Klaus was just so kind. He radiated it once he took off his dark hood and unfurled his brow. Or when he stopped carrying his large ax over his shoulder like he was ready to swing it at any given moment._

_It didn’t matter to Jesper that he toward over him by a good two feet and could literally just pick him up and brush him aside. Klaus just evoke a certain warmth in him that would seep into Jesper’s very skin, or into anyone else who was lucky enough to be bear him._

_Being next to Mogens felt like standing on the shore of the ocean in the dead of night. No matter how warm you bundled up, the cold ocean air would forever pull at you, stealing whatever warmth you gathered for itself._

_And the more time Jesper was finding himself spending his time with him, the more he was starting to find out that Mogens was rather...worldly._

_He thought it was a fluke, when they first met. When Mogens tricked him into ringing the battle bell._

__Oh the reception! Of course. You just ring that bell and they’ll all come out with hors d'oeuvres…”_ _

__Then again when he gradually showed him the post office._ _

___High ceilings, rustic touches, central air, panoramic views._ _ _

__Or when Ms. Alva almost threatened to break his nose because he sent -gasp- children to school for her to teach. (Yes, yes, his means where to meet his ends but...hey. The town’s kids learned to read and write in the end. Was that really such a negative?)_ _

___Palpitations of the heart._ _ _

__Words and terms only used by what Jesper thought would be refined men, and certainly not some half asleep at the wheel ferryman from Smeerensberg. Jesper would be lying if he were to ever look at someone like Mogens and think he knew what the words like ‘hors d'oeuvres’,  
'palpitations’ and ‘panoramic’ even meant. _ _

__Mogens was starting to make Jesper feel...less special? How stupid would that have sounded saying out loud? Was that petty?_ _

___Of course it is, city boy_ Jesper’s mind scorned him lightly. _ _

__But he was. He couldn’t help being petty over this. Mogens had known Klaus longer. “Friends” he said was being generous, but the fact still remained. He knew about Lydia. What else did he know about Klaus that Jesper didn’t. What Jepser didn’t know about the stoic man could fill a book._ _

__A book, which Mogens would probably enjoy reading with a fine dark glass of wine, reclining in a leather plush armchair. Probably a damn pipe hanging from his mouth. Clean shaven. His hat set aside and his hair combed through with thick pomade. The picture of elegance and grace.._ _

__It was a silly image to come up with, but Jesper always did have a strange imagination. It didn’t help that Mogens was draftsman of pretty good talents that seemed to have traveled the world in his younger years._ _

__What had Jesper done in the past...twenty or so years of his young life? Drank sherry, played cards, infuriated his father, spent his father’s money, lounged, relaxed, rested, played more cards, and then finally ‘loving coaxed’ to join the royal postal academy all while kicking and screaming until he found a way to lounge there too before his father just became too fed up._ _

__Klaus changed all that. Smeerensburg changed all that._ _

__Jesper just spat it out. He was starting to feel Mogen’s half lidded eyes bore into the side of his head._ _

__“I’ve never had a friend before, a real one, like Klaus. I don’t think my butler counted.”_ _

__“You had a butler? Of course you had a butler.” Mogens said under his breath to himself._ _

__“Do you think it’s ...odd?”_ _

__“Well...I mean having a butler sure does show that-”_ _

__“No, no, not that. That I consider a widower who’s almost four times my age my best friend?”_ _

__Mogens swirled what was left inside his flask. He almost took the last swing, but then capped it instead, placing it back into his breast pocket, near his heart._ _

__Jesper looked over at him when the captain didn’t say anything immediately._ _

__It was getting dark outside now, casting the rest of the cabin into a vial of blue and starless black. The fire, still going strong, was throwing dancing flames of gold onto Mogens face. His eyes reflected its flames._ _

__“Nah. I don’t think it’s strange at all,” he said, jerking, surprising himself that he sat unmovingly for so long._ _

__“I think friends come in all shapes and sizes. You have to be lucky enough to see that you have one when you get one.”_ _

__He smiled at Jesper._ _

__Jesper liked the way Mogens said that and smiled back._ _

__Klaus decided to step back in at that moment, his heavy coat and hood on him. The Saami women from before who had picked the black berries was at Klaus’ side, now with a freshly baked in her hands. She decorated the top with a delicate bread pattern of braids framing it._ _

__The center was a cutout in the unmistakable shape of Jesper’s hat._ _

__“Volgende keer, breng deze man weer bij u thuis,”  
(“Next time, bring this man with you again,)  
she said joyfully and bounced over with her big dress to Jesper, handing off the pie to him. _ _

__“Hij kijkt stoer. Hij kan helpen verhogen.”  
(He looks sturdy. He can help lift.”)_ _

__She looked Mogens up and down and then nodded curtly as if she was agreeing with whatever she had just said. She patted Mogens on the cheek like that other Saami woman did to Klaus when they first arrived._ _

__It was a pat of approval._ _

__All three men looked at each other again and shrugged, but nodded._ _

__“Best we get going, before it really does become too dangerous out there with the black ice. Nothing’s worse that two day old black ice. It almost never melts. Just becomes slipperier,” Klaus advised._ _

__Mogens, rising to his feet, one hand on his knee and pushing himself up, bobbed his head in agreement._ _

__Jesper didn’t want to leave the warmth and safety of the fire. Especially because when he left it, it meant going back out into the cold, night. He was dreading riding back home with Mogens again, but now it didn’t seem so bad._ _

__“Oh and Jesper,” Klaus started, already looking a bit sheepish._ _

__“Yes?”_ _

__“Inga here has requested to come along. She also baked an apology pie for Alva. But she also wants to pick up some supplies from town.”_ _

__“Oh? Well sure, no problem. Uh, unless there is a problem? You made it sound like there was a problem.”_ _

__Mogens caught onto it much faster, and he snorted._ _

__“Looks like we’re riding buddies again!” he said with far too much fake glee._ _

__Oh. Well...sure...no problem ...Jesper wanted to say through gritted teeth._ _

__Of course._ _

__If Jesper rode with Klaus, Inga would ride with Mogeans, and man she had never met before alone. Jesper didn’t want Mogens riding with Klaus alone, if he could help it, with him in the back with a woman he didn’t share a common tongue with._ _

__It also left Stamps in an awkward position even if Inga had no problem riding with Mogens. What was Mogens accepted to do? Return Jesper’s horse and cart to him like Bergheart? Not likely._ _

__Hell would have to freeze over first._ _

__//_ _

__Holding the pie, Jesper climbed in his cart first, Mogens, like an asshole (or...was it like a gentleman? Mogens blurred the line too much), held out his hand for Jesper to take, like a high lady, so he could climb up without losing his balance._ _

__Jesper didn’t take it and brushed past him. Mogens took no offense and climbed up after him, taking Stamps’ reins up once more._ _

__Klaus pulled his sleigh up next them and Mogens said “wow” when he saw all eight reindeer lined up in their harness, pulling the sleigh beside them._ _

__They were magnificent creatures. One was beautiful already, but eight? It was magical. No wonder the kids in the town made up such vastly imaginative stories about Klaus._ _

__The red and gold sleigh was a nice touch._ _

__Two reindeer closest to Stamps got curious and poked their muzzles at her. She in turn berraed softly at them, sniffing at their antlers._ _

__Klaus waved goodbye to them. Inga dipped her head. He thanked them again for their concern, and he promised he was going to make it up to Alva somehow._ _

__“Jesper I will see you tomorrow night then?”_ _

__Jesper nodded at him, keeping up a good front._ _

__“Wouldn’t miss it.”_ _

__Klaus was the one who winked at him, as if you say ‘unless another storm comes’._ _

__Then they were off. Klaus yelled out a “Ya! Onward!” and all eight reindeer snapped up to attention and raced down the road. They were almost out of sight before Stamps could even blink._ _

__Black ice wasn’t going to be a bother to them._ _

__Jesper sighed. A puff of thick breath seeped out from his nostrils. They would need to go soon, or they would be riding at a snail's pace in the dark._ _

__“Well!” Mogens pipped up when Jesper stared off after Klaus. He had that lost widow by the window look in his eyes again. “That was fun and totally not a waste of a day or my time.”_ _

__“I’m sorry you had such a terrible time with Klaus hospitality,” Jesper said, rolling his eyes up to the night sky, leaning back in the open faced coach to look at the stars that were speckled within the haze of purple sky._ _

__Mogens clicked his teeth at Stamps and gave her a small whip of the reins to nudge her forward. She neighed, almost like she was half asleep and then picked up one heavy feathered hoof and pulled forward._ _

__Mogens didn’t say anything for quite some time but he did whistle every now and then. First a tune. Then random notes. Then popping sounds with his lips. When it became too dark, he grabbed at the little lantern that hung above and over Stamps’ harness._ _

__He opened the glass door to it, and with the experience of lighting millions of candles in the wind on the sea's open waters, struck the match inside. The tiny fireball blazed tall and bright before catching the wick inside._ _

__Jesper always had trouble getting it on the first try. Or second. Or third. He always made sure to carry extra matches in his uniform just in case the fourth try didn’t ignite the oil wick within the lantern._ _

__“You know the trick to lighting those on the first try?” Mogens said as if reading Jesper’s mind. But he was just making small talk. Not reading thoughts inside someone’s head._ _

__“You grab the wick and pitch it off. It’s easier to hold and the oxygen coming off your hand pulls the fire’s flame more towards the wick. Like it’s being concentrated.”_ _

__“Fascinating.”_ _

__“Say,” Mogens said, not appreciating Jesper’s flat tone after being shown and told something rather helpful for him to know for the future, “enlighten me. But what was it like growing up having literally everything done and handed to you?”_ _

__Jesper refused to break his staring contest with the stars._ _

__“You have no idea how I grew up.”_ _

__“I think your father painted a pretty enough picture for me to get the gist.”_ _

__That made Jesper swirl his head back down and over to the smirking captain._ _

__“Lier,” Jesper snapped, “there’s no way my father said anything of the sorts to you about that.”_ _

__“About what?”_ _

__“About my pampered life and lazy dead end prospect.”_ _

__Mogens’ hmmmmed at him playfully._ _

__Jesper just...God dammit. Why was Jesper so dumb around Mogens. WHY._ _

__“A pampered life with lazy dead end prospects, eh? Sounds’ just awful.”_ _

__“Har-har.”_ _

__“I mean it. I would hate to live like that. Aimlessly. Pointlessly. Draining society of its daily goods with no output. Every day bleeding into the next without you even realizing it. A self made purgatory of your own making. The luxury of your privilege suffocating you all while-_ _

__“Yes! Yes, ok. Ok. Yes. I was not spending my time wisely. I get it. You don’t have to shove it in my face.”_ _

__“You’re weren’t “spending” your time at all. You were just wasting it. Big difference.”_ _

__“Says the boatman that sleeps at his post for eighteen hours of the day.”_ _

__Mogens sly smile spreads on his lips, but he clearly didn’t let the comment rub him the wrong way._ _

__“True. But that’s because I’ve had my fun,” he said and reached over to tap Jesper on his temple._ _

__“But you,” he taps the same spot again, “may as well be dead up here already if you live your life with nothing to show for it.”_ _

__Mogens settles back to his side. Jesper tightens his hold on the heavy ceramic of the pie that warmed his lap._ _

__“You’re starting to sound like Klaus with his little nuggets of wisdom,” Jesper says honestly._ _

__“That’s the smartest thing you’ve said all day, Postman.”_ _

__//_ _

__Jesper spoke far too much about his past life and could barely get anything out of Mogens all while Stamps brought them closer and closer to town._ _

__He would have never taken Mogens to be a secretive type of man, what on earth could someone like him keep secret anyway, but he ended up being a man of mystery by the time they reached the bottom of bridges that lead to the docks._ _

__Every time Jesper tried to ask him something, he would cleverly redirect it back at Jesper._ _

__The captain still didn’t tell him if he was a Krum or a Ellingboe or how even ended up here in Smeerensburg. And Jesper thought Klaus was a tight lipped fellow._ _

__Mogens seemed much more interested in the postman’s posh past life style anyway. In the end, Jesper told him most of it. There wasn’t really much to tell either._ _

__When every day was nothing but waking up whenever you wanted, puttering around a larger than large family estate and then settling down for rich dinners and hot baths, only to do it all over again the next day, it sounded rather dull._ _

__“You mentioned you were good at cards,” Mogens said._ _

__“Not good. Amazing. I was winning pots so often it became more of a game of how badly I could piss of the Zaradon’s first born son, Micheal. I tried to get the worst winning hand. Nothing made his forehead throb more than when I would win a hand of Faro with worst combinations of cards.”_ _

__“You’re a shark.”_ _

__“More like guppy with a knife.”_ _

__That made Mogens chuckle and then added, “You won’t be able to beat me though. You play Poker? The far superior version of Faro.”_ _

__“Superior!? That’s where you’re wrong boatman. Pokers’ the poor man’s Faro.”_ _

__“Hence why you won’t be able to beat me.”_ _

__“I accept your challenge, _Captain_.” _ _

__They probably shouldn't have been giggled like school girls as loudly as they did. The echoes of their chattering and laughter carried up and it was so dark that most of the town’s folk were probably getting ready for bed._ _

__Stamps came to a slow halt and as Mogens stepped out of the cart, it leaned heavily to one side. He tipped the bill of his hat at Jesper is farewell. Jasper wanted to do the same, tip his hat at him, but the heavy glass he still held in his lap stopped him from lifting up his arm._ _

__He looked down at the pie with his hat’s silhouette on it. Suddenly, Jesper had a strange idea and he voiced it before he had a chance to really mull it over._ _

__“Wait. Will you want this? This pie. Tomorrow I mean. If you want. Me too at the post office.”_ _

__Mogens stopped in his tracks and raised an eyebrow at him quizzically._ _

__“I think you’re trying to say, “Do you want to join me lunch tomorrow and we can eat this pie?”_ _

__“I owe for the free shelter during the Scary Rain.”_ _

__“Ehhh, you already paid me back for that with your generosity with the breakfast and bath this morning.”_ _

__“....Right. Well, then I guess I owe you for that liquid dinner.”_ _

__“Can’t owe me for something I intentionally and willingly shared with you.”_ _

__Jesper’s lips became a fine line. Maybe he wasn’t as good at social cues as he thought he was, but was Mogens blowing him off? Honestly, Jesper wasn’t used to being told ‘no’, not really.  
‘No’s’ became ‘maybes’ became ‘well alrights’ after some greasy smiling and fluttering eyelashes paired along with large puppy dog eyes. The perfect combination. _ _

__Now? Now Jesper didn’t know what to react with._ _

__Jesper was at a loss of words again, sitting by his lone self in the carriage with a giant pie in his arms, feeling more and more like a fool as time stretched on._ _

__The postman nodded in acceptance._ _

__“Well thank you for coming up with me to check on Klaus then. I appreciate it, even though he was fine. I’ll see you around to-”_ _

__“Your place is awful drafty. I should know, I’ve poked my head through that window enough times. Why don’t you and that pie come back to the ferry tomorrow for lunch. It’s warmer there anyway.”_ _

__Jesper thought about it. Mogens wasn’t...wrong. That was true. His captain’s deck was indeed much warmer than his post station could ever be._ _

__“Alright,” Jesper says, “that’s fair.”_ _

__Then added quickly as if being struck by a brilliant idea, “I’ll bring the cards.”_ _

__“Tomorrow then,” Mogens nodded and turned, pulling a hand out of his pocket to wave him off, not turning around to do so._ _

__“Tomorrow,” Jesper agreed and watched the boatman lazily waltz down the cobblestones of the descending bridges, dipping down until he sunk out of sight towards the docks._ _


End file.
